Mideast - AFP
Switzerland to tax suspected Israeli settler exports
Date: Sun, Aug 08, 2004
BERN (AFP) - Switzerland is to slap provisional taxes on Israeli exports suspected of coming from Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories, a Swiss newspaper said.
"In over 30 cases frontier guarantee payments have been demanded from importers of 'made in Israel' goods, according to senior customs officials," the NZZ am Sonntag said.
The Swiss government subsequently confirmed to the Swiss media that the taxes collected would be kept by the authorities "until the precise origin of the products is established".
Under an accord concluded by the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), products exported by Israel to Switzerland are exempt from customs duties.
However, merchandise produced by Israel in the occupied territories is excluded from the agreement.
As well as Switzerland, EFTA includes Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein.
For the past two years, Switzerland's Secretariat of State for the Economy (SECO) has examined certificates of origin for 650 Israeli products but has so far been unable to distinguish the goods from Israel from those originating from Jewish settlements in the occupied territories.
SECO spokeswoman Rita Baldegger said it was difficult to obtain the necessary data to clarify the situation.
"The Israeli customs authorities often take a long time to respond and their declarations are often full of gaps or imprecise," Baldegger said.
On Thursday, the European Union (news - web sites) -- of which Switzerland is not a member -- and Israel concluded a country-of-origin accord which Brussels said it was confident had enough safeguards to stop goods made by Jewish settlers from entering the EU on preferential terms.
In 2001, the EU began issuing formal notices to European importers that goods stamped "made in Israel", thus benefiting from preferential tariffs, must be checked carefully to ensure they did not in fact come from settlements.
The EU argues that only products from within the internationally recognised borders of Israel are entitled to such terms, and not from settlements built on occupied territory.
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