Truck seized for sanctions violation in Latvia

On 10 January 2024, in order to ensure compliance with the sanctions imposed by the European Union (EU), officials from the VID Customs Administration carried out a customs inspection at the Terehova customs checkpoint on a truck (Lithuanian registration number) with a trailer (Lithuanian transit registration number), where the declared cargo was a trailer.

During the inspection, a second set of documents was found in the cab of the vehicle, in which the goods were indicated as a truck. Based on the findings, customs officials had reasonable grounds to suspect that the vehicle was being exported as cargo with the intention of later removing it from the register in Lithuania without declaring it as a vehicle, thereby circumventing the sanctions in force.

During the criminal investigation, it was established that false information about the actual origin, sender and recipient of the goods had been provided to the customs authorities.

By decision of the Tax and Customs Police Administration of the State Revenue Service of 12 May 2025, which was approved by the prosecutor of the Austrumlatgale Prosecutor's Office, criminal proceedings were initiated in the criminal proceedings and the property was handed over to the court.

On 9 June 2025, the court decided to recognise the seized property – the truck and trailer – as property related to a criminal offence, to confiscate it for the benefit of the state and to transfer the financial resources obtained to the state budget. The pre-trial investigation in the criminal proceedings is continuing. No further information is available at this stage in the interests of the investigation.

To date, the court has adopted 57 decisions to recognise the goods subject to sanctions (total value of approximately EUR 1,935,683) as related to the criminal offence under investigation (violation of EU sanctions) confiscate them and transfer the proceeds to the state budget.

Source: LSM