Handling illegally imported cigarettes

Customs officers checked the smuggled cigarette. Photo: Quang Hùng

According to Government’s direction, for confiscated cigarettes, if it was detected to be counterfeit or unqualified cigarettes, it would be destroyed in accordance with current law.

On the other hand, if the confiscated cigarettes were high quality, it would be handled under the pilot program by auction for domestic consumption or re-export; the period for the pilot is in 1 year, after that it will be evaluated in each year for extending the pilot.

When implementing re-export cigarettes, do not allow re-exporting by land and transporting to the nations that have common boundary inland; allow re-exporting only through international border gate, main border gate. Request the related Ministries, authorities, and provinces to strictly control the re-exporting, do not let the case of slipping goods in the domestic market happen.

The Prime Minister assigned to Ministry of Finance to lead and coordinate with Ministry of Industry and Trade, Government Office to draft Prime Minister’s decision about handling illegally imported cigarettes that were confiscated in accordance with the above suggestion. Then report to Prime Minister before the day of 15^th May 2017.