FCS struggles against corruption

The head of Federal customs service Andrei Belyaninov signed the order № 350 as of April 1st 2008 about compulsory decisions projects coordination of custom authorities that exercise registration and control with own security departments. Starting from this moment the heads of Federation customs service organization departments, regional customs and customs stations have to endorse the projects of any decisions (from decrees to telegrams) without fail in the Federal customs service own security department.

The head of Federal customs service Andrei Belyaninov signed the order № 350 as of April 1^st 2008 about compulsory decisions projects coordination of custom authorities that exercise registration and control with own security departments. Starting from this moment the heads of Federation customs service organization departments, regional customs and customs stations have to endorse the projects of any decisions (from decrees to telegrams) without fail in the Federal customs service own security department.

The appearance of above mentioned order in the department is explained by the necessity of “detection and preclusion of customs technologies that are used to the prejudice of economic state security interests”. It means that in customs service they managed to develop new technologies that are able to direct financial streams past the treasury.

As “Soyuznoe veche” newspaper points out, Valeri Draganov, a State Duma deputy and the former head of State customs committee, believes that such a document is a de facto recognition of a high level of the corruption within the customs authorities. According to experts data the size of corruption here reaches 25-30 billions dollars a year.

“The fact that henceforth any decision of customs officers will be under the control of their own security can be of course only welcomed. But a questions arises – who will control this security service?”, - asks the author of the article.