Russia seises 3 tons of smuggled goods destined for Cuba

Baltic Customs seized three tons of smuggled goods at the port of St. Petersburg. The goods were found in a container destined for Cuba, Russian outlet Sea News reported.

The items seized included “school backpacks, belts, men’s pants, men’s socks, women’s underwear, adult shoes, women’s pants, underwear, T-shirts, sunglasses, pens, and car parts,” said the report. Many of these items were imitations of famous brands.

The total weight of the goods in the container was 9872 kg—almost 10 tons— and contained almost 210 packages. The sender was a company registered in Naberezhnye Chelny, the second largest city in the Russian Republic of Tatarstan.

The shipment also “included a high probability of fake information.”

Alexey Kardashenko, head of the Baltic Customs Gavan post, noticed a possible “surplus” of goods during the inspection of the 40-feet container.  

“When we opened the container, we found a large number of small packages—the type of packages used for sending international mail to individuals—without the appropriate documents,” said Kardashenko.

The customs inspection found 35,700 pieces of undeclared goods weighing more than 2,700kg. The goods included shoes, underwear, disposable face masks, gloves, bedding, cosmetics, car parts, computer parts, phone cases, sports equipment, and tools.

Most of the seized products “contained logos of well-known brands such as Puma, Nike, Chanel, Under Armour, Calvin Klein, Adidas, Louis Vuitton Paris, Disquared2, Jordan, Levi’s, Versace, Tommy Hilfiger, UFM, Fila, New Balance, Reebok, Gucci, and Lactoste,” reported the Sea News.

The company was accused of administrative violation under Part 1 of Article 16.2 of the Administrative Code of the Russian Federation and “the issue is being resolved to start a criminal prosecution,” said the Baltic Customs.

The seized goods and products are still under investigation, according to custom authorities.

Representatives of the Brand owners also received a request to assess the damage.

Around 25,000 Cubans travel to Russia every year, according to Border Guard data published by El Pais. Moscow does not require visas and citizens of the Caribbean island travel to buy the products that are scarce in their home country and resell them in the black market.