1. The competent authorities of each Member State shall communicate to the Commission as soon as it is available to them:
(a) any information they consider relevant concerning:
- goods which have been or are suspected of having been the object of breaches of customs or agricultural legislation,
- methods or practices used or suspected of having been used to breach customs or agricultural legislation,
- requests for assistance, action taken and information exchanged in application of Articles 4 to 16 which are capable of revealing fraudulent tendencies in the field of customs and agriculture;
(b) any information on shortcomings or gaps in customs and agricultural legislation that become apparent or may be deduced from the application of that legislation.
2. The Commission shall communicate to the competent authorities in each Member State, as soon as it becomes available, any information that would help them to enforce customs or agricultural legislation.
1. Where a Member State's competent authorities become aware of operations which constitute, or appear to constitute, breaches of customs or agricultural legislation that are of particular relevance at Community level, and especially:
- where they have, or might have, ramifications in other Member States, or
- where it appears likely to the above authorities that similar operations have also been carried out in other Member States,
they shall communicate to the Commission as soon as possible, either on their own initiative or in response to a reasoned request from the Commission, any relevant information, be it in the form of documents or copies or extracts thereof, needed to determine the facts so that the Commission may coordinate the steps taken by the Member States.
The Commission shall convey this information to the competent authorities of the other Member States.
2. Where a Member State's competent authorities invoke paragraph 1, they need not communicate information as provided in Articles 14 (b) and 15 to the competent authorities of the other member States concerned.
3. In response to a reasoned request from the Commission, the Member State's competent authorities shall act in the manner laid down in Articles 4 to 8.
4. Where the Commission considers that irregularities have taken place in one or more Member States, it shall inform the Member State or States concerned thereof and that State or those States shall at the earliest opportunity carry out an enquiry, at which Commission officials may be present under the conditions laid down in Articles 9 (2) and 11 of this Regulation.
The Member State or States concerned shall, as soon as possible, communicate to the Commission the findings of the enquiry.
5. Officials of the Commission may collect the information specified in Article 10 under conditions laid down in that Article by common accord.
6. This Article is without prejudice to the Commission's right to information and scrutiny by virtue of other legislation in force.
TITLE IV
RELATIONS WITH THIRD COUNTRIES
