DANGEROUS fake cigarettes manufactured using slave child labour are being sold in East Lancashire, trading standards chiefs warned today.

They claim East Lancashire is being 'flooded' with counterfeit cigarettes sold on the quiet in pubs, clubs and at car boot sales.

They contain up to 75 per cent more tar and 28 per cent more nicotine than regular cigarettes.

In the last fortnight alone, three dealers in fake cigarettes have been dealt with by the courts.

Last month, Blackburn newsagent Mustaq Patel appeared before magistrates after a raid at his shop found more than 3,000 cigarettes and three kilograms of hand-rolling tobacco on which duty had not been paid. A fortnight ago, Saleem Moosa, of Lancaster Road, Blackburn, was jailed for his part in a plot to smuggle three million counterfeit cigarettes into the UK.

Meanwhile, another local man had his appeal against a four-year prison sentence imposed for importing four million cigarettes rejected by the appeal court.

Trading Standards chief officer Chris Allen, of Blackburn with Darwen Council, said they were just the tip of the iceberg.

He said: "A significant percentage are actual fakes made up of cheap tobacco, manufactured in unhygienic conditions in the Far East. Experts believe more than 100billion counterfeit cigarettes are produced each year in remote villages in China.

"Forget the claims about them being brought back as duty frees from a holiday in Spain, the chances are they've been produced in a sweat shop using child labour."

Counterfeit cigarettes cost the UK Treasury more than £2billion in lost revenue last year. East Lancashire is one of the country's hot spots for counterfeiting - both in terms of sales and manufacture.

A spokesman for the Department of Health, said: "When you smoke fake cigarettes you do not know what you are smoking."