Navy foils delivery to Sulu of P10.2-M worth of imported cigarettes

COTABATO CITY — Philippine Navy personnel on Friday seized P10.2 million worth of cigarettes from Indonesia that a small boat was supposed to deliver somewhere in Sulu province in the Bangsamoro region.

Commodore Francisco Tagamolila, commander of the Naval Forces Western Mindanao, and Brig. Gen. Prexy Tanggawohn, director of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region, separately told reporters on Sunday that the watercraft carrying the contraband was intercepted about two nautical miles off the Mauboh beachfront in Patikul, Sulu by Navy servicemen on two patrol boats of the Naval Task Force 61.

Sulu is one of the six provinces in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, close to Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia.

The Navy team that foiled the attempt to smuggle into Sulu the P10.2 million worth of cigarettes with Indonesian brands immediately turned over the contraband to the office of the Bureau of Customs in Zamboanga City.

The NFWM and units of the provincial police offices in Sulu and in Tawi-Tawi and the Western Mindanao Command had seized more than P100 million worth of cigarettes from Indonesia in separate anti-smuggling operations in seaside towns and in the territorial seas of both provinces since late 2022.