Customs Service provides arguments for toughening up penalties for smuggling

The Customs Service suggests imposing harsher penalties on the persons involved in illegal trading in goods. The bill provides for the immediate imposition of fines of 100% of the value of the contraband and the confiscation of the goods and means of transport used to smuggle contraband, Info-Prim Neo reports. Iurie Ceban, head of the Customs Service’s Law Implementation Department, told a news conference that the penalties for smuggling are much smaller than the damage caused to the state. According to him, the penalties proposed by the Customs Service will help combat smuggling and collect additional incomes into the state budget. “It is now evident that the criminal punishment is not effective as in reality it is not applied. We do not yet have persons imprisoned for smuggling contraband. The courts give only suspended sentences. We suggest imposing very tough economic penalties such as the confiscation of the goods and units of transport and fines of 100% of the contraband’s value,” stated Iurie Ceban. According to the data provided by the Customs Service of Moldova, 329 means of transport used to illegally transport goods, to the value of about 27 million lei, have been confiscated this year. If the legislation had been implemented, the state budget revenues would have increased as a result of the sale of confiscated vehicles. Over 240 million lei, not 122 million lei, would have been collected into the state budget based on the economic penalties imposed by the Customs Service in 2009- 2011.