MAGAZINEA quarterly publication of the General Authority of Customs - Qatar No. 52 - April 2014

Customs: damaging fake goodsin collaboration with the Interpol

Seizing one kilo and half ofopium and 9,000 bottle of wine851 commercial fraud report during last year

International Credence of the Academic Course

of Qatar Customs

An Emiri Resolutionestablishing The GeneralAuthority of Customs

التزام وتسهيلوريادة جمركية عالمية

رائدة جمركيـــة خدمـــات تقديم تتجـــاوز المشـــروعة للتجـــارة وتســـهم عمالئنـــا توقعـــات بفعاليـــة في تحقيـــق التنمية

المســـتدامة

Customs is an independent body

Restructure of customs and shifting it to a public directorate is a new launch that expresses the goals and ambitions of the State to achieve more effectiveness, development and specialization that benefit the country and the citizen in the frame of work strategy aims to achieve improvement and prosperity for Qatar and achieve Qatar Vision 2030.

Issuing the Emiri decree no (37) for year 2014 incorporating the General Directorate of Customs was the first step towards the administrative development in terms of increasing the number of the administrative units that support the professional customs work, improve work manners and raise the effectiveness of the existing procedures to cope with the wise vision of the country leadership.

We can say, the administrative restructure will strengthen the competition of the customs with itself in order to translate this restructure improvement into projects and programs to be implemented in the next stage to raise the internal and external efficacy of the customs and enable it to stretch to all economic and commercial sectors that have work relations with it as the customs is the crossing gate for goods that come in or go out of the country and implements the laws of 17 governmental body in the country.

With all this optimism, customs do not forget that all the achievements of the last period is a basic reference to achieving our future goals depending on the existing givens of customs work in Qatar and in the light of the past period, in which the Qatari Customs reached an advanced position at the Arab and international levels in terms of professional efficiency, administrative discipline and ability to run the customs work professionally and accurately.

Ahmed bin Ali Al Mohannadi

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The General Directorate of Customs fights the counterfeited goods due to their severe danger on the community which may result in various disasters and diseases, as such goods are badly manufactures and hazardous since they are made of bad materials.

In this context, during the year 2013, the General Customs Directorate recorded 861 minutes noting imitated goods, which varied between 689 minutes regarding commercial cheating and 162 minutes relating to the royalty in addition to arresting drugs and other prohibited materials that are arrested on a daily basis.

This statement comes as a result for the General Customs Directorates’ participation in the fair of the counterfeited goods that parallels the (Regional Interpol Anti Trading in the counterfeited goods and the royalty crimes) program, which is organized by the Ministry of Interior in cooperation with the Interpol Organization and in participation of 20 Middle Eastern and North African countries, as well as representatives from the private sector.

In this context, the Customs Directorate participated in damaging large quantities of counterfeited goods that inter across the air port and Abu Samra border point. This process took place in cooperation with the Directorate of Civil Defense/ Ministry of Interior and the International Interpol

aftar participation in the regional Interpol fair

In cooperation with the Civil Defense and the Interpol: Implementing two processes to damage counterfeited goods.

Customs: 851 minutes to arrest counterfeited goods during 2013

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Organization, as a number of counterfeited bags and hundreds of watches and eye-glasses were damaged.

This comes within the context of a study implemented by the International Tasks Company, which provides training courses for the customs officials. The study showed that the losses of commercial counterfeited goods and imitation is too large.

On the other hand, research shows that the Gross Total Production of the whole Arab countries has decreased to %13 during the year 2009, reaching to 1,66 Trillion $, compared with the highest level in 1,91) 2008 trillion $).

A modern official statistical study estimated the large of

the commercial cheating and imitation of the goods in the Arab world was estimated for the amount of 88 billion $. According to the same study, the losses resulting from commercial cheating in Saudi Arabia amounts to 11 billion $, whereas the losses of the Gulf countries amounted to 18 billion $ due to such practices.

On the other hand, on an international level, the value of the imitated goods and the commercial cheating reaches more that 780 billion $ per year, which represent about %5 and %10 of the international commercial trading.

However, there are no accurate figures showing the size of the imitated goods on an international level, but the estimated figures

show that the size of the imitated goods in the Arab region amounts to 50 billion USD.

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The General Directorate of Customs – Marine branch/ the General Directorate of Customs, managed to foil the smuggling of a large number of alcohol bottles as the smugglers attempted to smuggle them by using a secret way inside wooden boards through Doha port. The process included 9000 bottles amount to Q.R. 1,350,000.

In this context, Mr. Ahmed Yousif Al- Sahl, the Director of Marine Customs said that the smuggling process was foiled in cooperation between the customs directorate and the security entities in Qatar, using the system of surveillance of the arrival of the two containers

when they reach to the smugglers.

As a result, the cadre of the protective security attacked the smugglers in the evening in the storing location in the Industrial Area. There were 9,000 bottles of alcohol (of various brand and types) hidden in wooden board in such a secret way, and by using a camouflage process.

Mr. Al Sahl stated that the suspects were referred to the Capital›s Security Police for investigation and to continue the legal actions against the smugglers and to keep the arrested items, provided that the Customs Directorate will follow up the matter with the security authorities afterwards.

Mr. Al Sahil emphasized that the General Customs Directorate arrests large amounts of prohibited items, which are usually hidden by using secret and unexpected methods, confirming the intelligence and skills of the customs staff in knowing and discovering the new methods in hiding the prohibited materials.

It is worth mentioning that the marine customs, and during the last few years, have discovered large quantities of alcohol bottles, that were hidden in various methods; in this regard, large numbers of wine bottles were discovered in soup boxes in oil containers.

Customs and security units raid smugglers of 9000 wine bottles amounting to Q.R. 1,350,000

Delivering two containers by using the «controller» system to the smugglers network.

Detecting narcotics inside sweets and nutsDetecting banned pills smuggledinside country margarine

In the passengers’ lounge at Doha airport, customs offices managed to detect an attempt to smuggle pills that are banned to be traded. These pills were hidden inside a tin of frozen country margarine that was with a passenger coming from an Arab country.

The customs officers suspected the passenger and he was under surveillance until he arrived at the checkpoint. After inspecting his baggage, a frozen margarine tin/ can was seen, and it contained banned pills (which cause psychological effects” rolled inside plastic sacks.

In addition, the air customs directorate detected a number of attempts to smuggle pieces that are suspected to be hash and a number of pills that are banned from trading (kept in sacks of nuts and sweets), as the pills were mixed inside the sweet sacks, using secret methods.

Mr. Khalid Hamad Rashid Al- Ka’bi, deputy of the air customs directorate stated that the customs made

minutes for these incidents, as the contents were handed to the security authorities to complete the legal procedures and for investigation about such issues, stating that in case of detecting any kind of drugs, the Department of Anti Drugs will be notified to complete investigations, then to transfer the case to the Prosecution.

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During the months of October, November and December 2013, the General Directorate of Customs arrested a large number of narcotic materials with the passengers in the passengers’ lounge. These materials varied between narcotic pills, hash, marijuana and forged documents.

The arrested narcotic quantities

contained 22376 pills (Kiptagon), 144 (Tramadol), 350 grams of hashish and 337 grams of the marijuana plant.

The smuggling method varied” the large arrest was the intention to smuggle Kiptagon pills, which were hidden in one of the sides of a bag of an Arab passenger. In addition, hash

pieces were rolled in plastic sacks inside tins of country margarine, in addition to other materials were discovered inside the passengers’ baggage.

On the other hand, 3 forged passports were discovered as they were hidden in children pampers, not to forget discovering marijuana that was kept in a secret way inside newspapers and hidden inside the socks and shoes.

These materials were discovered through suspicion by the customs officers, in addition, the notices that are received by the Customs Directorate by the Department of Anti Drugs.

The air customs department – passengers lounge managed to foil smuggling a kilo and a half of opium that was with one of a passenger who was coming from an Asian country. The foiling process was performed with the help of the tracing unit/ Ministry of Interior.

On checking the suspect’s bag, some strange materials contained carbon papers, with a suspension that they are opium weighing 360 grams. This substance was kept

in the sides and bellow the bag. On the spot, minutes were prepared where the passenger, the bag and substances were handed to the Department of Drugs.

Statistics indicate that the highest percentage of drugs are smuggled through passengers and that smuggling rarely takes place through air freight since smuggling occurs by personal means, whereas air freight is represented in goods for a known company.

Customs foils smuggling one kiloand a half of opium

Forged passports and Hash inside shoesArresting 22 thousand narcotic pills inthe passengers’ lounge

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The customs directorate is concerned about the declaration process in terms of the valuable items that accompany the passengers; the declaration process takes place in terms of money currencies, financial instruments that are transferable to their bearer, the valuable metals and stones. This declaration comes based on a request by the customs officer in case of arrival and departure. The passenger shall comply in declaring what he has, and mention them in the specified form accurately, while refraining from declaration or declaring appropriately will subject him to legal investigation.

However, the declaration of cash currencies can take the following form:

The concerned customs official, in case of suspect, will ask the passengers to declare about what they have in terms of cash money or financial instruments that are transferable to the bearer. Here, a passenger will fill the declaration form.

The passenger shall declare all cash money or financial instruments that are transferable to the bearer, regardless of their value, which comes based on a request from the concerned customs official.

The customs directorates will keep enough quantities of such forms, in both Arabic and English, to be provided to the passengers who are asked to declare what they have in terms of the cash money or financial instruments that are transferable to the bearer.

If the passenger does not declare as required in the above items, or if his declaration was false or missing, then he is deemed as failed in the declaration, and here the concerned customs officer will investigate the reasons for

such failure, and notes full information about the identity, address and the resource of the cash money or financial instruments that are transferable to the bearer. On suspecting about the resource or that the objective is money laundry and to fund terrorism, then the official will reserve these cash monies or financial instruments that are transferable to the bearer, based on an official receipt. However, this process shall be carried without violating the application of the rules of the customs law if the act represents a crime of smuggling or a customs violation.

What do you Know about the customs declaration process?