Article 6a
1. The Council and the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy (the ‘High Representative’) may process personal data in order to carry out their tasks under this Decision, in particular: (a) as regards the Council, for preparing and making amendments to Annex I; (b) as regards the High Representative, for preparing amendments to Annex I. 2. The Council and the High Representative may process, where applicable, relevant data relating to criminal offences committed by listed natural persons, to criminal convictions or to security measures concerning such persons, only to the extent that such processing is necessary for the preparation of Annex I. 3. For the purposes of this Decision, the Council and the High Representative are designated as ‘controllers’ within the meaning of point (8) of Article 3 of Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 of the European Parliament and of the Council ( 9 ), in order to ensure that the natural persons concerned can exercise their rights under Regulation (EU) 2018/1725. 4. The competent authorities of the Member States, including enforcement authorities, customs authorities within the meaning of Regulation (EU) No 952/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council, competent authorities within the meaning of Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council ( 10 ) and of Directives (EU) 2015/849 ( 11 ), and (EU) 2014/65 ( 12 ) of the European Parliament and of the Council, as well as Financial Intelligence Units, as referred to in Directive (EU) 2015/849, and administrators of official registers wherein natural persons, legal persons, entities and bodies as well as immovable or movable property are registered, shall process and exchange without delay information, including personal data and, if necessary, the information referred to in Article 6b, with other competent authorities of their Member State, with competent authorities of other Member States and with the Commission, if such processing and exchange is necessary to carry out the tasks of the processing authority or the receiving authority under this Decision, in particular when they detect instances of breach, circumvention, or attempts at breach or circumvention of the prohibitions set out in this Decision. This provision is without prejudice to rules regarding the confidentiality of information held by judicial authorities.