The Real IRA was tonight accused of being behind the biggest ever attempt to smuggle cigarettes into Britain.
The republican dissidents masterminded the illegal importation of tens of millions of cigarettes which were seized by Customs officers at ports on both side of the Irish border, according to security sources in both jurisdictions.
Customers officers in Northern Ireland impounded a Cyprus-registered ship at Warrenpoint Harbour on the Co Down coast yesterday and uncovered millions of cigarettes hidden inside bales of timber.
By tonight they said they had counted 37 million cigarettes and were still counting - the figure was expected to exceed 40 million.
Just 24 hours earlier, customs seized 20 million cigarettes in the neighbouring port of Dundalk, Co Louth.
The security forces on both sides of the border believe the Real IRA was attempting to fund its campaign of terror by flooding the market in Ireland, Northern Ireland and Britain with the cigarettes.
A senior member of the Garda said : "The sheer quantity of cigarettes involved could not be absorbed in Ireland or the North, they would have gone to Britain as well."
The potential duty loss to the British Exchequer of the find in Co Down is over £3 million ST£8 million.
The Sylvewas impounded when it docked in Warrenpoint en route from Riga in Latvia. The cargo boat seized in Dundalk had sailed from Muuga near Tallin in Estonia.
Customs and Excise in Northern Ireland said their seizure was part of a national strategy to combat tobacco smuggling and put it into decline within three years.
"This sort of major seizure will have a huge impact on organised crime, representing a huge financial hit for them."
Northern Ireland security minister Ms Jane Kennedy said the seizures were a significant blow to organised crime and the paramilitaries to which it was linked.
Ms Kennedy, who heads the Organised Crime Taskforce, added: "Organised crime here in Northern Ireland does have clear links with paramilitary organisations.
"The Government, the Customs and Excise, the Police Service and the Organised Crime Taskforce is serious about taking them on."
She said the public must know that "the people who will sell them smuggled cigarettes are the same people who will sell their children drugs".
PA