Tag: cigars

This is the down side of free trade deals that Korean businesses are now experiencing which is competition with foreign brands to include in the tobacco industry:

Local tobacco-makers and farmers on Thursday questioned the Defense Ministry’s approval of foreign cigarettes on Korean military bases, saying it hurts national pride.

A welfare committee of the ministry approved the sale of foreign tobacco brands for the first time.

They include Marlboro Gold Original by U.S.-based Philip Morris, and Mevius LSS Wind Blue by Japanese maker JTI, according to Defense Ministry sources.

This will be the first time that foreign cigarettes are being sold at post exchange stores, effectively challenging the monopoly of KT&G. The move comes 10 years after the bidding process was opened up to foreign manufacturers in 2006.

The new brands approved by the ministry also includes Raison French Black and Bohem Cigar Slim Fit Brown by KT&G.  [Korea Herald]

You can read more at the link.

Here is a small example of one of the illegal scams the Kim regime has operating around the world to bring in foreign currency:

Two North Korean diplomats have been caught smuggling a large stash of top-end Cuban cigars into Brazil.

The two were arrested at Campinas International Airport in São Paulo, according to the Brazilian daily O Estado.

Both are trade attaches at the North Korean Consulate there.

They had come from Cuba via Panama carrying 3,800 cigars worth W90-150 million in six travel bags (US$1=W1,133).

Cigar smuggling is apparently a common sideline for North Korean diplomats in Brazil, Mexico, Peru and Venezuela who are under growing pressure from Pyongyang to earn valuta.

Top-end Cohiba Cigars sell for W40,000-50,000 apiece, but the North Koreans can buy them for 1/10 of that money in the Cuban black market.  [Chosun Ilbo]