2025-10-12 12:00
publication
2025-10-12 12:00
The Podlasie Border Guard and the police, in a joint operation, detained two Polish citizens suspected of smuggling cigarettes using weather balloons across the Polish-Belarusian border, the services informed.
The men were detained in the Kuźnica commune. “The detained 21-year-old men are suspected of, among others, smuggling tobacco products using weather balloons across the Polish-Belarusian border. Guides with KAS service dogs also took part in the activities,” the Podlasie Border Guard and the police said in press releases.
The services inform that items constituting evidence in the case, including: phones, SIM cards, devices used to locate sent balloons. One of the men was temporarily arrested, the other is under police supervision.
The case is supervised by the District Prosecutor's Office in Białystok, where all cases of smuggling using balconies are combined in one investigation. As the spokesman for this prosecutor's office, Łukasz Janyst, told PAP on Wednesday, the man who was arrested by the court was accused of participating in five cigarette smuggling using balloons; the total is 11.5 thousand. packs of illegal cigarettes. The offenses occurred between September 2024 and April 2025.
He was also accused of participating in an organized criminal group, twice failing to stop for Border Guard and police road checks and escaping with smuggling cigarettes. As prosecutor Janyst added, another accusation concerns the violation of the so-called the Sanctions Act, i.e. on special solutions for counteracting support for aggression against Ukraine and for protecting national security. One of the prohibitions included in this act concerns cigarette smuggling; these provisions treat cigarette smuggling as a crime punishable by no less than three years.
The second suspect was implicated in one such cigarette smuggling operation; among others, bail bond.
In recent weeks, the services have reported finding more balloons used to smuggle cigarettes in various places in the region. In the summary of last weekend, the services provided information about 10 cigarette smuggling cases – seven incidents were detected by the Border Guard and three by the police – a total of approximately 15,000 cigarettes were smuggled using balloons. packs of cigarettes, of which 10 thousand detected SG, and 4.9 thousand Police. In connection with these events, two Poles and three Belarusians were detained.
On Wednesday morning, police announced the location of two more balloons. One was found in Białystok at ul. Lodowa; the second – in the town of Olszewo, in the Boćki commune.
“The use of weather balloons for cigarette smuggling brings direct danger that threatens the life or health of many people or property. Such balloons can be filled with hydrogen, which in the right proportion with air creates an explosive mixture. If you notice a weather balloon, first of all, inform the services,” the services said in a statement. (PAP)
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