On tuesday, 24 of September, Mr. Gerassimos Thomas, Director General of the European Commission’s Taxation and Customs Union Directorate and one of the leaders in the process of EU customs reform visited CELBET headquarter in Warsaw.
It was occasion to have a short meeting with Head of CELBET András Bartha and Customs Control team which was working on a preparation of the Joint Customs Activity.
“Customs is part of economic security. It is not traditional trade facilitation anymore. It is economic and security issue”
– Mr. Thomas highlighted at the beginning of the meeting.
One of the issue, brought up during the visit was also new expert team: EUCABET.
Head of CELBET explained the aim and process of the JCA, aiming at the control of drugs, cash and IPR and cooperation activities.
Mr. Thomas was interested how Customs Control team defines the priorities of the border control, what IPR goods are seized and how the cooperation from Finland to Greece does look like.
Andras Bartha, Head of CELBET explained IPR cases and the role of a special team:
“ We know from practice that most counterfeit goods was related to the medical products and it is dangerous because of close relation to drugs. Our Task Force team is specially established to deal with issues on the Ukrainian border.”
Mr. Thomas, who has been a driving force in establishing the EU customs data hub and customs authority, expressed his high appreciation to all CELBET experts:
“You have created own brand and new attitude within customs”.
