SIPA

On 14 November 2013, acting upon orders by the Prosecutor’s Office and Court BH, members of the State Investigation and Protection Agency (SIPA), in a joint operation with members of the Indirect Taxation Authority BH, initiated searches at a number of locations in Banja Luka and Prijedor aimed at detecting items that might be used as evidence in a criminal procedure against several suspects.

In the framework of these activities, police officials of SIPA arrested four individuals due to grounded suspicion of having committed the criminal offence set out in the Article 250 of the Criminal Code BH “Organised Crime” in conjunction with the criminal offence set out in the Article 210 of the CC BH “Tax Evasion or Fraud” and criminal offence set out in the Article 216 of the CC BH “Customs Fraud”.

In this particular case, forwarding agents, importers and warehouse owners are suspected of tax and customs evasion during the import of various types of Chinese goods. It is estimated that these illegal activities made multimillion damages to the BH budget.

The arrested individuals were brought to the official premises of the State Investigation and Protection Agency in Banja Luka, where they will be criminally processed and handed over to the Prosecutor’s Office BH for further processing.

Searches are under way at several locations and the public will be duly informed about the outcomes of this operation.