The minibus was diplomatically marked.
At the Hungarian international automobile checkpoint "Záhony", which borders our checkpoint "Chop", customs officers of the neighboring state found a large consignment of undeclared tobacco products in a minibus.
The case would not have been so high-profile, but the fact that a woman with a Ukrainian diplomatic passport was traveling in a Mercedes-Benz Sprinter 314 CDI minibus with smuggled cargo either as an escort or as a passenger became public. Some media outlets wrote that the driver and his companion had diplomatic passports, but this is not true.
The editors of Auto 24 found out that neither the driver nor the minibus had diplomatic immunity. The diplomatic passport was presented only by a woman, the wife of one of the employees of the Ukrainian embassy in Hungary. She rode in the passenger seat.
On the official Facebook page of the National Tax and Customs Service of Hungary , it is stated that "a minibus with diplomatic markings arrived from Ukraine." To clarify, not with diplomatic numbers, but with diplomatic markings.
The door of the van was indeed sealed with a control piece of paper with the seal of the representative office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Lviv. However, very quickly the customs officers found out that this diplomatic "badge" on the double door turned out to be fake. The driver only wanted to hide behind the diplomatic immunity of his companion and at the same time it was stated that "they are not carrying goods that are subject to declaration."
When customs officers announced that they were going to check the bus, the driver and his passenger did not agree, locked themselves in the cab of the vehicle and started calling somewhere. Taking advantage of the moment, one of the tax officers opened the back door of a van loaded to the brim with boxes in black plastic bags.
It turned out that tobacco products were being transported inside under a fictitious diplomatic cover. In cardboard boxes in factory packaging, there were blocks of cigarettes with a filter.
Soon, the driver with handcuffs in his hands was already watching the search. In total, 141.5 thousand tons were found in the van. packs of Ukrainian cigarettes without labeling. The cargo and van of the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter were detained.
The Ukrainian was interrogated as a suspect in the crime of budget fraud (video below, without sound) with causing material damage on an especially large scale, as his act caused financial losses to the domestic budget in the amount of more than a quarter of a billion forints. The amount is large, in Ukrainian currency it is UAH 26.5 million (UAH 26,591,890).
Financial investigators took the driver suspected of a customs crime into custody, and the nearest district court in the Hungarian city of Nyíregyháza decided to arrest him.
The woman, a Ukrainian citizen, was allowed to leave the scene freely due to her diplomatic immunity.
Do you want to keep abreast of the latest events from the region and beyond? Subscribe to the Telegram channel "Voice of the Carpathians" and be the first to receive the latest information every day!