Fri Jun 11, 2010, 4:59 PM
By The Canadian Press
MONTREAL - The RCMP says it's dealt a major blow to cigarette smugglers with a pair of seizures near the Ontario-Quebec border this week.
Today, the Mounties and Quebec provincial police arrested four people near Riviere-Beaudette, Que., and seized 600,000 cigarettes in Ziploc bags.
Police nabbed three other people on Thursday along the shores of Lake St-Francois, and seized $1.2 million worth of illegal cigarettes.
Police say they aren't sure where the cigarettes come from, but both communities are along the St-Lawrence River with waterways that lead into both Ontario and New York.
Since the beginning of 2010, the RCMP has arrested 99 people for smuggling, seizing 39 million cigarettes in the process.
The federal government announced a number of initiatives last month to combat illegal cigarettes, including the formation of a specialized police unit led by the RCMP.
That specialized unit will start operating by next year.