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non-USA, by Country
· Philippines
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Question remains on whether manufacturers are colluding with syndicates (Conclusion)
Jump to full article: Newsbreak (ph), 2009-05-27
Author: Chay Florentino Hofileña
Intro: Tommy Chui, a former director of a Hong Kong cigarette distribution company, was set to testify against his former colleagues and implicate members of the infamous criminal group, the Triad, along with corrupt Customs officials.
That company, Giant Island Ltd. (GIL), was a major distributor of the British American Tobacco (BAT) in China and Taiwan, and was believed to have organized a smuggling network for BAT cigarettes. GIL was reported to have transported cigarettes from Singapore and Subic Bay in the Philippines from freighters to fishing boats in the South China Sea.
Documented by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), the case “reveals the dark underbelly of a billion-dollar business fed by international corporations and operated by organized crime,” its report published in 2001 says.
Links to Manila
Though based in Hong Kong, the operations had links to Manila through a GIL official named Hung Wing-wah, the company’s founder and majority owner, whom Chui had a disagreement with. . . .
BOC officials say that most of those in the super green lane category are multinational companies or companies that belong to the Top 100 corporations of the country with outstanding records. They say that random checks are still made on these shipments if intelligence information directs them to do so.
Customs officials, however, say that because cigarettes are classified as “high risk commodities,” these are always channeled to the red lane, where inspections are mandatory. Likewise, whenever shipments come in from countries on the BOC watch list—China, Hong Kong, and Vietnam, among others—they are automatically assigned to the red lane.
Smugglers know this and find means of circumventing customs checks. They either take pains to hide cigarettes in their 20- or 40-footer container vans that may not be as thoroughly checked by customs inspectors or, as previously mentioned, resort to circumlocutory routes so that goods come from countries not on the BOC watch list. They also alter the documentation of their shipments while in transit, or they simply mis-declare contraband cigarettes or bribe customs officials.
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