The police arrested five persons, including an employee of the Customs Service, on suspicion of involvement in smuggling. Purportedly, they organized the illegal passing of a truck with 140,000 packs of cigarettes to the value of about 1 million lei over the border. The truck was stopped on the territory of the Czech Republic, IPN reports.

According to the General Police Inspectorate, the suspects are from the municipalities of Chisinau and Balti. The police carried out 12 checks at the homes and storehouses of the suspects and at different companies where they confiscated bookkeeping records, invoices and customs declarations as well as samples of tobacco, stamps of different enterprises and CDs with electronic information. There was also seized a hunter’s gun without documents.

In order to take them easier out of the country, the suspects hid the cigarettes between wooden pallets. They face three to ten years in jail for smuggling of contraband in extremely large amounts.