Attempted to smuggle cigarettes to the EU using a hot air balloon: details from Volyn

An unsuccessful attempt to smuggle tobacco products by air was made in Volyn. State Border Guard Service employees discovered a suspicious package of cigarettes near the border with Belarus.

This incident occurred in the Shatsk community, where border guards of the local unit, while monitoring the territory, came across a package left near the state border. The State Border Guard Service reported this.

According to preliminary data, the smugglers planned to transport tobacco products to the countries of the European Union using a balloon.

The package was tightly wrapped in black plastic wrap, and a rope with fragments of a collapsed balloon was attached to it, suggesting an unusual delivery method. Law enforcement officers found 1,500 packs of cigarettes marked with excise stamps from Belarus.

In addition to tobacco products, two GPS trackers were found in the package. One of them was equipped with a SIM card of a Belarusian telecommunications operator, and the other – of a Polish network. This suggests that the illegal cargo was tracked during its movement towards Poland.

Border guards believe that the balloon carrying the contraband could have crossed the border and entered the EU, given the origin of the cigarettes, the chosen route, and the presence of technical equipment.

An investigative and operational group of the National Police was called to the scene. The contraband products and technical equipment were seized in accordance with current legislation. The estimated market value of the detected batch of cigarettes is about 90 thousand hryvnias.