Singapore national Tang Yong Hoe, sole director of freight forwarding company I-Do Logistics, was fined $105,000 (in Singapore dollars) by the State Courts for evading Goods and Services Taxes and submitting false customs information, Singapore Customs said Oct. 4. In 2018, Singapore Customs inspected a container imported by I-Do and found discrepancies in the packing lists and I-Do's submitted values for goods belonging to two consignees. One consignee, Zhang Feng, received the packing list from I-Do and knowingly submitted the false information, the customs agency said. Zhang was fined $2,000. In total, Tang was found to have evaded over $16,000 in GST, leading to his fine exceeding $100,000. “Any person who is in any way concerned in any fraudulent evasion of, or attempt to fraudulently evade, any customs duty or excise duty shall be guilty of an offence and will be liable on conviction to a fine of up to 20 times the amount of duty and GST evaded,” Singapore Customs said.

The European Commission appointed four individuals to its panel of independent experts to help the commission pick candidates to serve as adjudicators under the dispute settlement mechanisms in European Union trade and investment agreements, the commission said. The four are Bruno Simma, judge at the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal in The Hague; Inge Govaere, professor of EU Law at Ghent University; Jan Klabbers, professor of International Law at the University of Helsinki; and Pavel Sturma, professor of international law at Charles University.

The European Union General Court dismissed Maher Al-Imam's application to drop his sanctions listing from the EU's Syria sanctions regime, in a Sept. 22 ruling, according to an unofficial translation. Al-Imam challenged the European Council's assessment of the facts that the applicant was an influential businessman in Syria with connections to the Syrian regime. The court ruled that the council properly made this finding and that Al-Imam is an influential businessman in Syria. The court also held that the applicant's right to an effective judicial remedy was not violated and that the restrictions on the applicant's rights are justified given the human rights situation in Syria.

The European Union General Court dismissed the applications of 10 Democratic Republic of the Congo nationals to drop their 2019 sanctions relistings, in 10 opinions Sept. 15. The European Council's reasoning for the relistings was sufficient to allow the DRC nationals to challenge the validity of the acts, the court held. The EC also guaranteed their right to be heard by taking the applicants' observations and providing specific explanations, the court said. Even if the applicants were no longer DRC officials, the court said that the EC established enough of a link between the human rights situation in the DRC and the applicants.The orders concerned the applications of Jean-Claude Kazembe Musonda, Alex Kande Mupompa, Ferdinand Ilunga Luyoyo, Kalev Mutondo, Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary, Eric Ruhorimbere, Gabriel Amisi Kumba, Evariste Boshab, John Numbi and Celestin Kanyama.

Marco Dittrich, a Singapore-based importer, was fined $64,000 (in Singapore dollars) by the city-state's State Courts for evading Goods and Services Taxes on 46 shipments of bicycle frames and components, Singapore Customs said Sept. 17. The total amount of evaded GST was $13,483.89. Dittrich, the director of Singapore Tri-Global Pte. Ltd., pleaded guilty to one count under Singapore's Customs Act for undervaluing his import shipments. Under the Customs Act, fines can be levied “up to 20 times the amount of duty and GST evaded,” Singapore Customs said.

The European Union's General Court annulled the 2019 and 2020 relisting acts for Libya's former minister for agriculture, animal and maritime resources, Abdel Majid Al-Gaoud, in a Sept. 15 order. The judgment removes Al-Gaoud from the EU's Libya sanctions regime. The former minister died in March 2021 and was delisted by the EU the following month. The court said that the European Council should have taken Al-Gaoud's circumstances into consideration when deciding whether to relist him in that he stopped being minister with the fall of Moammar Gadhafi's regime and was held in prison 2011 to 2017. The court also reasoned that Al-Gaoud's position as a former minister did “not have a sufficiently solid factual basis” that justified keeping him on the sanctions list. Had the council simply relied on his position as a former minister, his status would have been “frozen” and the council's periodic review provided for in listing measures would have had no practical effect, the court said.

Kong Ming Jie, Singapore national and importer, was fined $50,000 by the Singapore State Courts for evading Goods and Services Taxes, submitting false declarations and failing to retain documents under the Customs Act, Singapore Customs said Sept. 10. Kong is the director of Nitecore Singapore Pte Ltd. and the only proprietor of Nitecore SG. Singapore Customs inspected a Nitecore shipment of LED flashlights and accessories at Changi Airfreight Centre in August 2019, finding that the declared value of the goods for one of the shipments was $400 but it was actually worth $23,336.47 (in Singapore dollars). For another shipment inspected the same month, Kong undervalued the goods by $8,000, Singapore Customs said. It said Kong pleaded guilty to five charges.

Two new advocates general have been appointed to the Court of Justice of the European Union and one new judge appointed to the bench at the General Court, the European Council said in a Sept. 8 press release. Anthony Collins of Ireland and Laila Medina of Latvia will serve as the two newest advocates general of the CJEU. Their tenures will run from Oct. 7 to Oct. 6, 2024, and Oct. 7 to Oct. 6, 2027, respectively. Since 14 judges and six advocates-general terms of office will expire on Oct. 6, Medina's appointment serves to fill one of the upcoming vacancies, while Collins' appointment fills the unexpired term of Gerard Hogan, who resigned his position. Peteris Zilgalvis of Latvia was appointed a judge of the General Court effective Sept. 8 until Aug. 31, 2025. His appointment partially renews the composition of the General Court of 2019, which had 23 judges with terms that expired on Aug. 31, 2019.

The European Union's use of trade defense measures in 2020, including antidumping and countervailing duties, succeeded despite COVID-19-related challenges, the European Commission said in a post highlighting its actions against unfair trade practices of the past year. The EU noted its temporary changes to regular practices, such as on-site verification visits. The commission also released statistics regarding its trade remedies. In all, the EU had 150 trade defense measures at the end of 2020, 10 more than in 2019, that included 128 antidumping measures, 19 antisubsidy duties and three safeguard measures. Ninety-nine of the 150 were imposed on China, nine on Russia, seven on India and six on the U.S. The commission also highlighted its new countervailing duties on cross-border financial support given by China to Chinese-owned companies making glass fiber fabrics and continuous filament glass fiber made in Egypt for export to the EU.

Vietnam's Hai Phong Customs Department launched the prosecution of a case of red sandalwood smuggling, the Customs Enforcement Team said Aug. 13 via the state-run Customs News website. The enforcement team detected a shipment of 297 sandalwood logs on the KMTC Tokyo container ship from Nhava Sheva Port in India that was transshipped across the Hong Kong Port to Vietnam's Dinh Vu Port May 26. The Hai Phong Customs Department initiated the shipper's criminal case July 30, transferring inspection documents and the wood to the Hai Phong Investigation Police Department, the report said.