MOSCOW: Bulgarian Interior Ministry Chief Secretary, Georgi Kostov, said that thirteen Bulgarian customs officials and three border police officers were arrested for cigarette smuggling ring at Kapitan Andreevo border checkpoint.
Police in Plovdiv seized a shipment of smuggled cigarettes and arrested the entire customs shift that allowed the cargo truck through the checkpoint. A second truck was seized at the Kapitan Andreevo checkpoint after police reviewed the surveillance cameras.
In total, the two trucks carried cigarettes worth 16 million leva, or about 8.2 million euro. As many as 15 other trucks had been allowed into the country by the same smuggling ring in recent months, Kostov said.
The smugglers used papers claiming that the cigarettes were only transiting Bulgaria, but at Kapitan Andreevo the drivers would change the Turkish licence plates to Bulgarian ones and use papers claiming that they were transporting textile goods, according to police.
The customs officials would be detained for at least 24 hours, but it was unclear whether the entire shift was complicit to the smuggling operation, prosecutor Ivan Daskalov said.
