Source: Diário Digital - Portugal - 20/07/2010

The General Directorate of Customs and Special Taxes on Consumption (DGAIEC) seized 400 cigarettes on Sunday inside the Spanish ferry boat «Volcan de Tijarafe», said that official.
In a press release, DGAIEC informs that the customs delegation of Portimão seized a "high quantity of cigarettes - 400 thousand - in a control action carried out on Sunday, in the port of Portimão".

The tobacco was in a vehicle transported on the Spanish ferry boat «Volcan de Tijarafe» and was hidden between sofas and washing machines in a vehicle.

The seized cigarettes are of the brands Ducados, Pallmal and Marshall and were transported on the vessel that operates the regular line between Portimão, Funchal, Tenerife and Las Palmas (Spain).

At the time of the arrest by Customs, the person in charge and driver of the vehicle was a citizen of Colombian nationality, with a Spanish residence permit.

The individual was detained to report to the Public Prosecutor's Office in Portimão.

Last June, more than two million cigarettes from the brands Fortuna, Nobel, Pall Mall and Chestersfield, worth 339 euros, were seized at Via do Infante, near Olhão, during a merchandise inspection operation, he said today official source.

In the operation, the GNR, in addition to seizing tobacco and three vans, detained three individuals for the crime of smuggling circulation, whose penal framework provides for a prison sentence of up to three years.

Digital Diary / Lusa