COLOMBO, Sept 3 (NNN-XINHUA) – Sri Lanka Customs transferred approximately three million cigarettes, confiscated during the first half of this year, at Colombo Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA), for destruction, state media reported yesterday.
The estimated street value of the cigarettes handed over to the Ceylon Tobacco Company (CTC) for destruction, exceeds 75 million rupees (250,000 U.S. dollars), said the report.
If these cigarettes had reached the Sri Lankan market, the country would have lost roughly 480 million rupees (1.6 million U.S. dollars) in duties and other levies, according to the report.– NNN-XINHUA
The cigarettes were primarily smuggled by passengers arriving by air, said the report.
CTC, a subsidiary of British American Tobacco (BAT), holds the monopoly of cigarette and tobacco sales in Sri Lanka, where cigarettes are subject to high taxation.
