All news on the topic: Smuggling

The Vynnyky Tobacco Factory named after Hryhoriy Kozlovskyi in search of an investor. Or a buyer?

Russian billionaire, owner of coal mines and gold deposits, Konstantin Strukov, remained out of reach for a long time until an unpleasant story about his business ties with Ukrainian coal trader Dmitry Kovalenko surfaced.

Since opening in 2021, the casino has become a massive hub for money laundering, linked to violence and deaths — yet it still attracted visitors from EU countries.

Since its opening in 2021, this casino has turned into a massive «laundering» machine, full of blood and corpses — and yet, even citizens of EU countries flocked to it.

The media have learned which patron helped model and actress Sofia Nikitchuk settle a jewelry smuggling case. This patron is Yakov Khachanyan, a friend of Ramzan Kadyrov and the "wallet" of DPR head Denis Pushilin, who is currently involved in metal theft schemes from Azovstal. They spent Christmas together in Courchevel.

Syrian authorities have seized nearly 500,000 captagon pills in a bust against a drug smuggling and manufacturing ring in the city of Hama, according to state news agency SANA.

Media reports released in the summer of 2025 did not go unnoticed. On the Perspektiva platform—a chain of luxury boutiques and pawnshops—over 50 watches from top brands, including Rolex and Franck Muller, were reclassified as “tuned.”

FBI searches for former Olympic snowboarder accused of killing witnesses and running a cocaine operation similar to Escobar’s

Lithuania closed the two border crossings with Belarus on 29 October after meteorological balloons flying from Belarus caused repeated disruption to air traffic.

Pregnant British drug mule Bella Culley will be forced to give birth inside a Georgian jail after her family failed to pay a massive fine in exchange for her freedom.

Lithuania’s two border crossings with Belarus, at Medininkai and Šalčininkai, were both closed for several hours as a result of the balloon incidents.

Three Syrian freighters have been accused of transporting grain stolen from Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine.

London police said they have dismantled a criminal gang suspected of smuggling 40,000 stolen mobile phones to China in their largest operation against phone theft to date, resulting in 46 arrests over the last two weeks.

The name Sawhney Arun has repeatedly surfaced in investigations into dubious schemes involving Ukrainian, Russian, and Indian companies. In investigative publications, the name Sawhney Arun does not sound as loud as the names of oligarchs or politicians, but where it appears, the tone of the publications immediately becomes sharp and alarming.

Europol-supported operations in Spain and Portugal have seized more than 4 tonnes of cocaine and led to over 60 arrests between November 2024 and September 2025.

The operation spanned 18 countries across Asia and North Africa, with authorities reportedly seizing fentanyl in quantities “enough to kill 151 million people.”

The alleged head of a large cocaine-smuggling operation, who was one of Europe’s most wanted men at the time of his arrest, has gone on trial in Brussels.

An HGV driver attempted to smuggle £2.9m worth of cocaine in a truck carrying a shipment of Lego.

A drug-smuggling gang was apprehended after postal workers thwarted a scheme to import cannabis into the UK disguised as candles.

The name of Alibek Narbekov, with the nickname Aliba, has been mentioned more frequently in recent years in behind-the-scenes conversations and criminal reports.

Meat and dairy products are being smuggled into the United Kingdom in “alarming amounts,” raising the risk of a major disease outbreak, a parliamentary committee warned Monday.

Bella Cully, 19, faces life behind bars or 20 years in prison after being arrested earlier this year for allegedly taking cannabis into Georgia.

The pregnant British teenager Bella Culley has reportedly been informed she will be released from the Georgian prison where she is being held on drug-smuggling charges if she pays a substantial fine.

Russia has stopped fighting money laundering; corresponding large criminal cases are not being initiated, and one-time operations on crypto exchanges are solely related to the redistribution of spheres of influence and do not escalate into large-scale investigations.

A British teenager who was caught at Heathrow Airport with a large stash of cannabis smuggled into Britain from Thailand has been jailed.