Long An: facing difficulties in cigarette smuggling

	Long An: facing difficulties in dealing with cigarette smuggling
	Seizing nearly half a million of foreign cigarettes and tonnes of suspected herb ingredients in Mong Cai
	Cigarette smuggling is still problem on the Quang Tri border

Market Management Forces of Long An province seizesmuggled cigarettes.

Complicated developments

Steering Committee 389 of Long An province has pointed out the modes of operation such as transporters, carriers, or use vehicles across the border, gathering and then using a car (four to seven seats) for transportation and consumption in neighboring provinces. These suspects are active mainly at night from 9pm to 2am.

According to Steering Committee 389 of Long An province, in September 2020, the provincial authorities seized more than 617,000 packages of smuggled cigarettes, bringing the total number of smuggled cigarettes captured by the forces since the beginning of the year to nearly 1.8 million packages.

Typically, in the third quarter, Long An Market Management force discovered 79 cases of transporting and trading smuggled cigarettes and temporarily seized 23,912 packages of foreign cigarettes. In the first nine months, 43,488 packs of smuggled cigarettes were discovered and seized.

In addition, the market management force discovered 43 cases of violations on trading smuggled cigarettes at fixed trading points, fined over VND129 million, confiscated over 1.2 million packages of foreign cigarettes.

Typically at 00:30 on June 21, in the area of ​​Binh PhongThanh town, MocHoa district, the Market Management Team No. 2 detected a person driving a car from the Cambodian border. When detecting functional forces, the suspects stopped the car and ran away. Checking the vehicle, the functional forces found 6,500 packs of Hero and Jet branded cigarettes. The case was transferred to the MocHoa district police office by the Market Management Team No. 2 for criminal prosecution in accordance with the law. Also taking advantage of the night to transport smuggled cigarettes, at 23:00 on July 5, through inspection in the area of ​​ward 6, Tan An city, Market Management Team No. 3 discovered 5,700 packs of smuggled cigarettes.

Facing many difficulties in control and handling

Throughclose coordination between the functional forces of Long An province, in the prevention of smuggling across the border and prevention of tobacco and other products, strictly controlling close to the area. However, according to Steering Committee 389 of Long An province, they are facing many difficulties and problems in the control and handling of cigarette smuggling.

Specifically, according to the current status of the border between Vietnam and Cambodia in the dry season. Therefore, some smuggled cigarette transporters have transported tobacco from Cambodia to Vietnam, despite the My QuyTay station with up to seven posts with hundreds of Border Guard officers on duty all the time since the Covid-19 pandemic started.

Therefore, smuggled cigarettes arebrought into Vietnam, because this side is blocked, they run to the other side. The trick to take advantage of the dark to transport smuggled cigarettes into Vietnam is not new.However, with so many posts set up along the border, the suspects still dare to transport them showing profits from pirated cigarettes are huge.

On the other hand, the police unit prosecuted and investigated many cases of transporting illegal cigarettes and suspended the investigation from 2019 because the accused had not been identified. In which, the amount of temporarily seized material evidence is over a million cigarette packs of smuggled cigarettes.

However, because there are no documents guiding the handling of material evidence in the case of suspending the investigation. Therefore, the inventory of cigarettes has not been destroyed.

Besides, according to the regulations, smuggled cigarettes are banned goods with unidentified value. Under the provisions of Decree 97/2017/ND-CP, the case must be transferred to the person with the highest sanctioning competence to make a decision to handle confiscation. With the above provisions, recently, in the province of Long An, the handling of dossiers and cases of smuggling, transportation and trading of smuggled cigarettes has caused an overload for competent authorities in handling like the Chairman of the People's Committee of the province or district.