In 2015, 16.5% of all cigarettes consumed here arrived through the black market.

Ireland’s black economy is booming even as legitimate enterprises are enjoying record increases in sales.

It’s a ‘win-win’ for criminals as the discovery of €1.5m in laundered money on a farm in Co Limerick indicates.

Limerick’s only licensed tobacconists is to stop selling cigarettes because of an “epidemic” of illegal trading of smuggled packs on city streets.

International gangs consider Ireland an easy target for smuggling, and will continue to operate here if stricter measures are not enforced, a retail group has warned.

Cork City Council has been asked to revoke casual trading licences to anyone caught selling smuggled cigarettes.

Retailers fighting tobacco and fuel smuggling are concerned that gangs here are setting up manufacturing plants to produce illicit cigarettes.

The Irish Heart Foundation has slammed the "paltry" increase in excise duty on cigarettes and its failure to impose a so-called sugar tax on fizzy drinks in the Budget.

Plain pack cigarettes will mean fewer child smokers, two leading anti-smoking charities have claimed.

Ireland is set to become the second country in the world to introduce plain pack cigarettes, it emerged today.

Consumers buying illegal cigarettes should receive on-the-spot fines, said a member of a body seeking a crack down on smuggled goods.

OVER 100 gardaí as well as officials from Revenue and the Criminal Assets Bureau were yesterday involved in a major early morning operation which led to 15 arrests and the discovery of 100,000 contraband cigarettes.

More than 650 jobs have been lost in retail in the last year, according to a new survey.

THREE hundred corner stores have been offered black-market tobacco to sell, research reveals.

Three hundred corner stores have been offered black-market tobacco to sell, research revealed today.

A dedicated Garda taskforce is needed to tackle the black market trade in smuggled cigarettes, shopkeepers claimed today.

Youngsters are being used as mules by tobacco-smuggling gangs to go door-to-door delivering packets of cheap cigarettes in housing estates, it was claimed tonight.

Customs officials were tonight counting more than 12 million smuggled cigarettes seized in two massive hauls.

Customs officials have seized up to six million smuggled cigarettes in the third multi-million euro tobacco haul in a week.

CRIME bosses were set to earn around €20 million profit if the consignment of 120 million cigarettes was not intercepted by the state.