Smuggled and undeclared cigarettes detected on Armenia’s border with Iran in nine months exceed the full 2025 total by 31%

About 575 thousand packs of cigarettes were detected at the Agarak checkpoint on Armenia’s border with Iran in the first nine months of 2026 using the full range of customs control tools, 31% more than in the whole of 2025. BusinessDaily learned this from a statement by Armenia’s State Revenue Committee (SRC), the country’s tax and customs authority, responding to media coverage of an Armenian-registered company’s attempt to export to the US 37.9 thousand packs of tobacco products without excise stamps hidden inside laminate doors.

“The Anti-Smuggling Department of the State Revenue Committee continues its consistent fight to uncover cases of goods being smuggled across the state border of the Republic of Armenia.

“The unit for operational control of air border checkpoints and e-commerce of the SRC Anti-Smuggling Department received information that a business entity registered in Armenia was preparing to export a large batch of tobacco products to the US through the Cargo freight complex by concealing it from customs control. Acting on the operational information, control was established over the entity’s export shipments.

“As part of this control, Anti-Smuggling Department officers carried out a customs inspection of laminate doors being exported to the US at the Cargo freight complex. Each of the doors weighed twice as much as a standard door made of the same material. During the inspection, all of the exported doors were dismantled. As a result, 37,900 packs of tobacco products made in various countries, without excise stamps and concealed from customs control, were found.

“A report on the violation of customs rules has been drawn up, and the case files have been sent to the SRC Legal Department,” the statement released on October 20 read.

The SRC’s response of October 21 states: “The State Revenue Committee expresses its bewilderment at publications that have appeared in some media outlets in recent days, in which the facts about the detection of another case of exporting tobacco concealed from customs control are presented with distorted interpretations, unjustly overshadowing the work carried out by SRC units.

“In particular, we consider it necessary to emphasize that the case was uncovered as a result of control work carried out by the relevant SRC units. Therefore, there was neither a need nor a basis to refer to any media outlet in the official statement on the detection. Moreover, the information materials on the case had been prepared and edited days before publication, but given the important events being held in Armenia, a more suitable time was chosen for their release. Attempts to link the circumstances of the detection to media publications are therefore groundless.

“We also recall that the detection of cases of tobacco moved in concealment from customs control is the result of the daily, consistent work of SRC units, and the case in question is no exception. To confirm this, it is enough to visit the SRC’s official website and search for the keyword ‘tobacco’ to find numerous similar publications. Presenting the detection of a single case as a consequence of media publications or as a sensation therefore not only fails to reflect reality but also ignores the results of the customs service’s continuous work.

“We also note that neither the packs nor the outer packaging of the illegally moved tobacco products found at the Cargo freight complex in Zvartnots bear any markings that would confirm they were illegally brought into Armenia through the Agarak customs checkpoint on the state border.

“We consider it necessary to stress that SRC units carry out customs control on a daily basis within the powers granted to them by law. Customs offences are uncovered through systematic control work and are not prompted by media publications. The effectiveness of the customs service should be assessed on the basis of facts and recorded results, not assumptions or arbitrary interpretations.

“To underline the importance of relying on facts, we note that from January to September 2026, the SRC’s anti-smuggling tools uncovered about 209 thousand packs of cigarettes, exceeding the figure for the whole of 2025 by 49% and that of 2024 by 122%.

“In addition to these figures, we add that in the nine months of 2026, the full range of customs control tools at the Agarak border checkpoint, among the land checkpoints on the state border, uncovered about 575 thousand packs of cigarettes, exceeding the figure for the whole of 2025 by 31%.”

Agarak is the only land crossing between Armenia and Iran. It lies in southern Armenia, in the Meghri community of Syunik province, on the Araks River, opposite Iran’s Norduz checkpoint.

According to statistics published on the SRC website, no cigarettes were officially imported into Armenia from Iran in 2024, 2025 or the first half of 2026. Supplies from Iran are limited to unmanufactured tobacco and tobacco refuse: 510.6 tonnes worth $2.08 million in 2024 and 78.4 tonnes worth $225.7 thousand in 2025. In the first half of 2026, imports reached 92.1 tonnes worth $180.6 thousand, compared with 66.4 tonnes worth $190.8 thousand a year earlier. Imports of other tobacco fell from 4.9 tonnes ($40 thousand) in 2024 to 19 kg ($0.9 thousand) in 2025. Armenia imported 1.91 billion cigarettes (about 95.6 million packs) worth $37.1 million in 2025 and 949.9 million (about 47.5 million packs) worth $19.7 million in the first half of 2026, up 57.1% year on year.