The European Public Prosecutor's Office (EPPO) in Zagreb on Monday issued an indictment against six cigarette smugglers suspected of damaging the Croatian budget by €3.22 million and the EU budget by another €80,000 through customs evasion.
In addition to illegal trading of cigarettes from Dubai and tax or customs evasion as part of a criminal enterprise, the prosecution also charges the group, which operated from March 2021 to January last year, with bribery.
The investigation found that cigarettes were shipped from Dubai to Croatia, and then illegally transported to other EU member states via the southern Croatian port of Ploce, without undergoing the mandatory customs declaration procedure, and were sold on the black market.
They attempted to bribe an undercover investigator
It was also established that the smuggled cigarettes, after being delivered in containers from Dubai to the port of Ploce, were transported by truck to a warehouse in Zagreb, rented out by two defendants.
In order for the containers to undergo official customs procedures without being inspected, the defendants paid a total of €90,000 to an undercover investigator who posed as a customs officer, the EPPO reported.
The defendants are charged with having organised the maritime transport of a total of seven containers with at least 90 tonnes – or 5,798,400 boxes – of smuggled cigarettes from Dubai.
Three of those containers with at least 35 tonnes of smuggled cigarettes were illegally transported to Croatia and then transported by truck to Slovenia, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland and other EU member states for sale on the illegal market.
Significantly higher damage prevented
By doing so, they achieved undue pecuniary gain of at least €2.7 million. The estimated damage to public finances amounts to around €3.3 million, of which €3.22 million relates to the budget of the Republic of Croatia, and the remaining 80,000 euros to the EU budget on the basis of customs evasion.
Since the smuggling of four cigarette containers was not carried out, as they were seized by customs and police officers, further damage to public finances was prevented.
