This year, in eastern Ukraine, border guards liquidated the activities of 12 criminal groups involved in smuggling and counterfeiting.

This year, in eastern Ukraine, border guards liquidated the activities of 12 criminal groups involved in smuggling and counterfeiting.

Thanks to the work of operative-search units of the Eastern Regional Directorate of the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine, since the beginning of this year, 23 bases of accumulation of contraband and counterfeit goods and 78 places of their sale have been identified and terminated. This is mainly about excisable goods. Particularly, more than 840 thousand packs of cigarettes, 43 tons of counterfeit alcohol, 1.3 thousand tons of counterfeit fuel and equipment for its production were seized from illicit trafficking. The total amount of seized goods amounted to over UAH 180 million.

Border guards also eliminated the channel of illegal capital assets turnover between the temporarily occupied and controlled territories of Ukraine and the activities of transit-conversion centers, which carried out shady transactions and financed the illegal element.

At the request of border guards of the Eastern Regional Directorate, 37 criminal proceedings have been instituted for committing crimes in the economic sphere. This year, for committing such crimes, 4 people received court convictions and imprisonment for a term of 1 to 3 years. The courts also imposed fines in the amount of UAH 119,000.