The Customs Administration could in June begin fining people who smuggle counterfeit goods valued at less than NT$5,000 and that infringe upon copyright laws, an official familiar with the matter said.
The administration proposed an amendment to the Customs Anti-smuggling Act (海關緝私條例) to make penalties for the exportation and importation of counterfeit items fairer, the official said.
The current act stipulates that smugglers or those dealing in smuggled goods may be fined up to three times the value of the goods and that the items may be confiscated.
Photo: CNA
However, the act exempts individuals from fines in cases in which the duty-paid value or the free-on-board (FOB) value of the goods does not exceed NT$5,000. The exemption does not apply to guns, ammunition and drugs.
The act also stipulates that if declared goods are found to be counterfeit and infringe on patent, trademark or copyright laws, a fine of up to three times the value of the goods may be imposed, and the goods be confiscated.
That means that while smugglers are exempt from fines if they have imported counterfeit goods of lesser value, those who report the goods to customs must pay fines regardless of the value, the official said.
The proposed amendment would expand the list of items not covered by the exemption to include counterfeit goods that contravene patent, trademark and copyright laws.
If the act is implemented, smugglers would be fined up to three times the value of the counterfeit goods, regardless of what their duty-paid or FOB values are, the official said, adding that counterfeit products would be confiscated.
The proposed amendment is open to public comment until April 28 and could be implemented in June, they said.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comment last year on Tokyo’s potential reaction to a Taiwan-China conflict has forced Beijing to rewrite its invasion plans, a retired Japanese general said. Takaichi told the Diet on Nov. 7 last year that a Chinese naval blockade or military attack on Taiwan could constitute a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, potentially allowing Tokyo to exercise its right to collective self-defense. Former Japan Ground Self-Defense Force general Kiyofumi Ogawa said in a recent speech that the remark has been interpreted as meaning Japan could intervene in the early stages of a Taiwan Strait conflict, undermining China’s previous assumptions
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
RSS