Under the procedural guidance of the Office of the Prosecutor General, in collaboration with the Main Department for Countering Systemic Threats to State Management of the Security Service of Ukraine, the activities of a group of individuals led by the current Deputy Director of the International Cooperation Department of the State Customs Service of Ukraine have been exposed.

He involved a group of officials from the NGO "International Diplomatic Mission 'Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe'", who, under the guise of a special monitoring mission of the OSCE in Ukraine, established a mechanism for receiving "rewards" for issuing pseudo-OSCE certificates to citizens of Ukraine.

These "certificates" allowed individuals to avoid mobilization.

The official was detained in accordance with Article 208 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine while receiving $6,800 for the production of another batch of certificates. A notice of suspicion is being prepared under Part 1 of Article 114-1 and Part 3 of Article 369-2 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.

Additionally, during a series of investigative actions and operational-search measures conducted by law enforcement, several other criminal schemes at customs in various regions of Ukraine have been dismantled.

In particular, searches were conducted at the Chernivtsi customs as part of the investigation into the smuggling of cigarettes.

Prosecutors of the Chernivtsi Regional Prosecutor's Office are conducting procedural guidance in a criminal proceeding regarding the smuggling of excise goods and their illegal production, storage, sale, or transportation for the purpose of sale (Part 2 of Article 201-4, Part 1 of Article 204 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).

According to the investigation, in the spring of this year, a large batch of tobacco products was illegally exported from Ukraine to Romania through the international automobile checkpoint "Porubne" of the Chernivtsi customs, declared as mineral wool. The truck with the smuggled cargo was detained by Romanian border guards. More than 130,000 packs of cigarettes were found and seized in the vehicle.

The possible involvement of customs officials in organizing the smuggling channel is being verified. The pre-trial investigation is being conducted by detectives of the Territorial Department of the Bureau of Economic Security in the Chernivtsi region with operational support from the Security Service of Ukraine in the Chernivtsi region.

During a special operation in Odesa, four officials from the local customs anti-smuggling department were exposed for extorting illegal benefits from entrepreneurs for the unhindered export of goods from Ukraine.

In addition, searches were conducted at the officials of one of the customs posts in the Odesa region, who received illegal benefits for customs clearance of products without payment of customs duties.

Officials of the Volyn Regional Customs are suspected of causing damage to the state budget of nearly 2.7 million UAH. They were exposed for unjustified clearance of duty-free imports of foreign-made vehicles.

Under the procedural guidance of prosecutors, the pre-trial investigation into the identified facts of illegal activities by customs officials is ongoing.

Systematic work to detect and prevent such crimes continues.

Photo: law enforcement agencies of Romania