CUSTOMS DESTROYS RS.210 MN WORTH ILLICIT FAGS AT CTC

Astock of foreign cigarettes worth more than Rs.210 million illegally imported from Malaysia was yesterday publicly destroyed by the Sri Lanka Customs at the crushing unit of the Ceylon Tobacco Company. The Customs Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) detected the 20-foot container carrying 3.5 million sticks of claw-flavoured specialty cigarettes under the brand ‘Diarum Black’ when it arrived at the Colombo Port in December last year. The consignment had arrived from Malaysia and declared as wooden tables and chairs. The Customs checked the container on suspicion and detected the contraband.

Customs sleuths found several tables and chairs in the front portion of the container but the rest with neatly packed foreign cigarettes.

Deputy Director Customs Central Investigation Bureau, G B Gnanaraj told Daily Mirror the goods had been addressed to a consignee in Kollupitiya.

With the detection of the contraband, the freight forwarding company in charge of the container had allegedly attempted to direct the illicit consignment to an Indian port but was not allowed to do so.

Upon inquiry the consignee had told the Customs that they had no knowledge of the illicit goods and that someone had used their name to smuggle it.

The Customs officials are however investigating through the international agent in charge of the consignment to determine the person who had actually ordered it from Malaysia. The consignment was destroyed in a special illicit tobacco related products crushing unit placed at the CTC Head Office in Kotahena yesterday.

CTC Director Operations Dr. Rukshan Gunathilaka explained how the destroyed tobacco residue would be later sent to a commercial cement manufacturing plant in Puttalam to be further destroyed in their furnace.

According to CTC Director Legal Ranjan Seneviratne an estimated 450 million sticks of illicit cigarettes had entered Sri Lanka in 2017 with a street value of Rs.22.5 billion, yet resulting an estimated loss of Rs.17 billion to the government as revenue. CTC AIT Manager Nalin Jayasuriya was also present amongst a number of Customs and Police officials that took part in the event.

Customs CIB team is conducting further investigations on the instructions of DDC G B Gnanaraj. According to Customs the estimated loss of revenue to the government from this consignment was Rs.150 million.