National Customs Agency

Customs officers at Lesovo BCP found 481 000 pieces (24 050 boxes) of smuggled cigarettes in a truck. The tobacco products were hidden in pallets with declared clothes hangers.
The truck with foreign registration arrived at the Lesovo border checkpoint on 08.02.2026 on an inbound route to the country. In the customs control area, the driver, a Turkish citizen, presented documents stating that he was transporting groupage cargo from Turkey to Romania in transit through Bulgaria. Based on a risk analysis, a thorough customs inspection of the vehicle was carried out. During the control actions with specialized X-ray equipment, the inspectors marked suspicious areas in the declared cargo. During the subsequent physical inspection, it was found that 3 of the pallets with declared clothes hangers contained cigarette boxes inside.
Pre-trial proceedings have been initiated in the case, which are being conducted by an investigating customs inspector, under the supervision of the Yambol District Prosecutor's Office.
Nearly 2 million pieces of smuggled cigarettes have been seized by customs officers at the Lesovo MP since the beginning of the year alone. In most cases, the excise tobacco products were hidden among declared goods for EU countries, where market prices for cigarettes are significantly higher. In one of the recent cases, 711 000 pieces of cigarettes were found inside insulation panels in a truck also traveling from Turkey to Romania.