US snubs out legal cigar transaction

The Copenhagen Post ^ | February 27, 2012 | Peter Stanners

[Daffynition]

Foreign minister intervenes after Danish man loses appeal to have 137,000 kroner returned to him by the Americans Due to the trade embargo, the trade in Cuban cigars is illegal in the USA (Photo: Colourbox)

Authorities in the US have refused to return 137,000 kroner that was confiscated from a Danish policeman who attempted to legally purchase Cuban cigars from Germany.

Torben Nødskouv intended to resell the cigars through his small business Cigarhuset and made the transaction in dollars with a Hamburg-based distributor. But the transaction, which was automatically routed through the US, was picked up by American authorities who froze the money, arguing that the transaction violated the American trade embargo with Cuba.

[Daffynition]

Operation cigar aficionado. I feel so much safer.

[madmaximus]

Good! Tobacco is whacko, kills more people than booze and all the hard street drugs combined!

Communist-made tobacco is all the worse.

[Talisker]

Good! Tobacco is whacko, kills more people than booze and all the hard street drugs combined! Communist-made tobacco is all the worse.

Oh shut up, you idiot. Go hug unconstitutional nanny state overreaches in your bathroom - not here.

[Still Thinking]

Good! Tobacco is whacko, kills more people than booze and all the hard street drugs combined! Communist-made tobacco is all the worse.

Even if true, what moral/ethical/legal standing does that give the US government to not only interfere in a transaction between a Dane and a German over Cuban products, but to go so far as to seize the Dane's money??? It wasn't his idea to route the transaction through the US, and even if it were, so what? The transaction logically has nothing to do with the US, per se, and is therefore none of their business, certainly not to the extent of keeping the guy's money.