The Korea Customs Service said Thursday that it detected and handed over to prosecutors a group of smugglers who illegally reimported some 3 billion won ($2.6 million) of Korean cigarettes from China.

A 54-year-old Korean national surnamed Kim, along with 10 accomplices, smuggled in October-December last year 16,000 packs of Korean cigarettes that had earlier been exported to China and Hong Kong, according to the customs office.

The gang also manufactured some 50,000 packs of counterfeit Korean cigarettes in China and also attempted to smuggle them into Korea.

Their smuggling plan was triggered by the government’s announcement in September last year that it would raise the tax on filtered cigarettes to 3,318 won from 1,550 won per pack, an attempt to promote people’s health and boost the nation’s tax income.

“Cigarettes that are sold in the domestic market are obliged to allocate 30 percent or more of the packaging surface area to health warning messages,” said an official of the KCS.

“But these smuggled cigarettes contain less conspicuous messages and are actively traded in the black market.“


(telme@heraldcorp.com)