Cigarette counterfeit: United Tobacco shut down
Ukraine’s largest producer of counterfeit cigarettes has ceased to exist. According to the head of the Verkhovna Rada Finance Committee Daniil Getmantsev (Sluha Naroda), only during the war the company did not pay to the state budget more than 5 billion hryvnia excise tax. The company in question may be United Tobacco, which has been repeatedly suspected of producing counterfeit products, Obozrevatel writes.
“The SBU search of the factory lasted more than 2 months, during which the crooks tried to delay the actions of investigators and “cut” using their usual tools. However, these tools no longer work in the new Ukraine. A huge semi-legal tobacco factory has finally ceased to exist,” the MP said on Telegram.
At the same time, he stressed: The company’s seven ultra-modern cigarette production lines have been “finally dismantled”. And two more, “which the thieves brought into Ukraine, but did not have time to install”, will be found “and seized in the near future”.
“Since 2015, the factory has become a symbol of Ukrainian corruption, saturating the market with excise-free tobacco under the tacit consent of all law enforcement officers blind to the workings of the superpowered enterprise. During the war alone, the looters did not pay more than 5 billion hryvnias of excise tax to the state budget,” Hetmantsev said.
Cigarette counterfeit. What is known about United Tabacco
The company, which produced cigarettes under the brands PULL and Marshall, has been repeatedly suspected of producing counterfeit cigarettes. For example:
- In 2021, searches were carried out and 90 tonnes of tobacco products without excise stamps were in question;
- In 2018, journalists from the Schemes programme published an investigation with the results of an expert examination, according to which out of 8 packs of United Tobacco cigarettes, only one had the original excise stamp affixed to it;
- journalists of Channel 5 ordered a repeated examination in June 2021: fake excise stamps were glued to 8 out of 11 packets of cigarettes manufactured in Zheltiye Vody.
According to YouControl, the director of United Tobacco is Vyacheslav Vershuta. United Tobacco’s founder is SENTROTREYD LIMITED, an offshore company registered in the Marshall Islands.
The ultimate beneficiary of United Tobacco is listed as Yelena Boyko, a resident of Yellow Waters. According to Bihus, she is a former partner of Ruslan Zhurilo. And the cigarette production facility is located at the former Electron instrument factory, where Zhurilo used to be a director.
As reported by OBOZREVATEL, earlier the Bureau of Economic Security (BES) revealed the illegal production of cigarettes of famous brands in Odessa region. The total value of tobacco products and equipment – UAH 150 million. The estimated loss from non-payment of taxes by the detected illicit manufacturers is UAH 90 million per month.
Law enforcers 2 weeks unable to seize equipment of illegal Zhurilo-Martynenko tobacco factory in Zheltiye Vody
“United Tobacco, said to be largest producer of counterfeit cigarettes, has had its license revoked