Six cars and more than 1.5 million cigarettes have been seized from container trucks by customs officers, who also arrested two men. Officers yesterday showed off the dismantled left-hand-drive vehicles that were found in a container at the Lok Ma Chau control point on its way to the mainland on Wednesday morning. The lorry's manifest declared it was carrying a cargo of plastic materials, but officers searched the truck and found the six cars in the container and arrested the 36-year-old driver. Officers said the vehicles were worth about $800,000. The haul brings to 106 the number of cars customs officers have seized so far this year. The vehicles are valued at $2.74 million. Smuggled cars are usually transported by sea and few cases of cars being imported or exported from Hong Kong by road have been reported. This was the first time in five years that smuggled cars had been found at Lok Ma Chau. The number of smuggled cars seized by the Customs and Excise Department has risen sharply this year. Last year just 15 cars were found and in 2004 customs officers seized 56. In 2002 and 2003, just nine smuggled cars - four by land and the others by sea - were seized. Also at Lok Ma Chau on Wednesday, officers arrested a 60-year-old driver after finding 1,570,000 cigarettes worth $2.3 million in his truck. If sold legally, the cigarettes could have generated a potential duty revenue of $1.26 million. Customs officers arrested the driver after stopping and searching his vehicle after he crossed the border and entered Hong Kong at about 8pm. A customs spokesman said the department would 'continue to take vigorous enforcement actions against cross-boundary smuggling activities'. The spokesman added that investigations into both cases were continuing.