HÀ NỘI — The Hà Nội Customs Department and the economic police yesterday checked four packages shipped from United States to Hà Nội in July and found some 350kg of electronic cigarettes and vape liquid.

The goods owners – Nguyễn Kim Th, 27, and Trần Việt Th, 22, both living in Hà Nội – failed to show police import permission and authorised papers from the Việt Nam National Tobacco Corporation for import of the goods.

They had also missed the deadline for submitting customs documents.

For such reasons, the goods are seized, sealed off whilst the owners were required to pay administrative fine.

Also yesterday, the Hà Nội Customs Department, economic and drug police found 82.5kg of khát leaves containing the stimulant cathinone – a drug banned in Việt Nam.

The leaves were hidden carefully in packages which were supposed to be shipped by air to the United States.

Initial investigation showed that the sender was a man named Phạm Văn Duy from northern Lào Cai Province.

Earlier, in July, Hà Nội’s customs and police seized 199 packages containing over 2.5 tonnes of Khát leaves sent by air from other countries to Hà Nội. Both the sender and the receiver were hired for transportation in Việt Nam.

Khát (Catha edulis), a flowering plant native to the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, contains a monoamine alkaloid called cathinone, an amphetamine-like stimulant, which is said to cause excitement, loss of appetite and euphoria.

In 1980, the World Health Organisation classified it as a drug of abuse that can produce mild to moderate psychological dependence, although the organisation did not consider khat to be seriously addictive.

Khat is illegal or used as a controlled substance in many countries, including Việt Nam, although its production, sale and consumption are legal in some African nations. — VNS