The State Customs Committee of Belarus proposes to expand the customs' powers to combat the illegal circulation of certain goods

September 30, Vitebsk / Sergey Kochetov - BELTA /. The State Customs Committee of Belarus is preparing proposals to expand the powers of customs authorities in combating the illegal circulation of certain goods. This was announced today by Vasily Dementey, Deputy Chairman of the SCC, at a joint meeting of the commission of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Union of Belarus and Russia for Security, Defense and Crime Prevention and representatives of the Vitebsk Regional Council of Deputies, legislative bodies of the Pskov and Smolensk regions in Vitebsk, reports a BELTA correspondent. The proposals concern amendments to administrative legislation regarding the granting of additional powers to customs authorities to draw up protocols on administrative offenses, the subject of which are ferrous and non-ferrous metals, petroleum liquid fuel, alcoholic and non-food alcohol-containing products, non-food ethyl alcohol, radio-electronic means and other marked goods. The need for such adjustments is due to the emergence of certain violations of customs legislation in the conditions of the Customs Union. At the same time, customs services lack sufficient rights and powers when conducting inspection activities regarding imported goods and goods in circulation that are the subject of such offenses, explained Vasily Dementey. In the first eight months of 2010, Belarusian customs officers detected over 13.8 thousand violations of customs legislation, which is 8.6% more than in the same period last year. The volume of seized smuggled goods increased by more than 35%. -0-