The Inter-Agency Center for the Prevention of Corruption at the Customs started operation at the Ministry of Finance

On August 29, the Inter-Agency Center for the Prevention of Corruption at the Customs started operation at the Ministry of Finance.

Minister of Finance Oleksandr Danyliuk had a meeting with representatives of the State Fiscal Service, State Border Service and National Police (i.e., with all parties involved in the activity of the Center and the mobile groups) to examine the current status of the Center and the preparation of the mobile groups.

During the meeting, the new head of the Inter-Agency Center Oleksandr Vlasov reported about the current activities of the Center and the schedule for the launch of the mobile groups.

In the beginning of September, the first ten mobile groups will arrive to their designated locations to serve as rapid reaction and prevention units. The groups will be located in Kyiv, Lviv, Odessa, Transcarpathian and Volyn regions. A while later, further ten groups shall start operations in the border regions. During the meeting, it was decided to build up a personnel reserve for the Center and the mobile groups.

The Minister of Finance also stated that the personnel will be subject to rotation to reduce corruption risks – i.e., the mobile group teams will be changed every month in accordance with the share of each involved authority (SFS – two persons, Border Service and National Police – one person respectively).

“Our next point on the reform agenda at the customs is to launch the Center and the mobile groups which will be operating on the entire territory of Ukraine. Personnel and equipment – all is set and ready to start. I will be monitoring their performance by myself”, Oleksandr Danyliuk said.

Additional information:

- the Inter-Agency Center will be coordinating the activities of 20 joint mobile groups in charge for preventing and detecting violations of customs regulations;

- representatives of the State Fiscal Service, State Border Service and National Police will have their representatives working at the Inter-Agency Center;

- the analysts team of the Center will be detecting risk operations in the area of responsibility of the respective customs offices and transferring the relevant data to the parties in charge;

- the mobile groups will be working 24/7 on the entire territory of Ukraine and ensure rapid reaction to reports on customs rules violations provided by the analysts team;

- the Inter-Agency Center and the mobile groups will be preventing corruption activities (pursued by customs officials as well as by private business), supporting crackdown on corruption as well as increasing the transparency and effectiveness of customs control and other kinds of state control.