An officer of the Maldives Customs Service has been suspended for alleged involvement in the case of cigarette smuggling by air cargo. This was revealed by the Commissioner General of the Maldives Customs Yoosuf Maniu, during a meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on National Security Services.
Customs seized cigarettes worth USD 103,905.97 smuggled into the country via air cargo, in June this year. The authority seized 173 cartons or 1.7 million cigarettes in a joint operation conducted with the Maldives Police Service and the Maldives National Defence Force on suspicion of smuggling cigarettes into the country without completing the formal procedures of customs.
Maniu disclosed that the officer suspended in the case was stationed near the scanning machine. He explained that they released some of the shipment to track down those involved in the case. While the estimated value of the cigarettes is USD 103,905.97 million, USD 363,670.9 million is due to the state as import duty.
Additionally, Maniu disclosed that the authority also seized a large number of cigarettes that were being smuggled into the country under the guise of tissue. The shipment arrived in Maldives on May 19 last year and was declared to contain 343 cartons of tissue paper. However, they were able to seize 200 master cartons of cigarettes along with 143 cartons tissues. Maniu noted that the total number of cigarettes seized during the operation stood at 3,199,200.