Citation, commencement and interpretation

1.-(1) These Regulations may be cited as the Republic of Serbia (Prohibition on Investment) Regulations 1998, and shall come into force on 1st August 1998.

(2) In these Regulations, "the EC Regulation" means Council Regulation (EC) No. 1607/98 of 24th July 1998 concerning the prohibition of new investment in the Republic of Serbia(3).

Offence of breaching Article 1 of the EC Regulation

2. Any person who commits a breach of Article 1 of the EC Regulation shall be guilty of an offence.

Authorisations

3.-(1) Authorisations for the release of funds or other financial assets on a case-by-case basis pursuant to Article 2 of the EC Regulation shall be given by or on behalf of the Treasury.

(2) If, in connection with a request for such an authorisation any person-

(a)makes any statement or furnishes any document or information which to his knowledge is false in a material particular, or

(b)recklessly makes any statement or furnishes any document or information which is false in a material particular,

he shall be guilty of an offence; and any authorisation granted pursuant to the request shall be void as from the time it was granted.

Information

4. In accordance with Article 4 of the EC Regulation, the Schedule to these Regulations shall have effect in order to facilitate the obtaining, by or on behalf of the Treasury, of information for the purpose of ensuring compliance with the EC Regulation.

Penalties and proceedings

5.-(1) Any person guilty of an offence under regulation 2 or 3(2) above or under paragraph 2(b) or (c) of the Schedule to these Regulations shall be liable-

(a)on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or to a fine, or both;

(b)on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months or to a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum, or both.

(2) Any person guilty of an offence under paragraph 2(a) of the Schedule to these Regulations shall be liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale, or both.

(3) Where any body corporate is guilty of an offence under these Regulations, and that offence is proved to have been committed with the consent or connivance of, or to be attributable to any neglect on the part of, any director, manager, secretary or other similar officer of the body corporate, or any person who was purporting to act in any such capacity, that person as well as the body corporate shall be guilty of that offence and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly.

(4) Proceedings against any person for an offence under these Regulations may be taken before the appropriate court in the United Kingdom having jurisdiction in the place where that person is for the time being.

(5) No proceedings for an offence under these Regulations, other than a summary offence, shall be instituted in England, Wales or Northern Ireland except by the Secretary of State or with the consent of the Attorney General or, as the case may be, the Attorney General for Northern Ireland:

• Provided that this paragraph shall not prevent the arrest, or the issue or execution of a warrant for the arrest, of any person in respect of such an offence, or the remand in custody or on bail of any person charged with such an offence, notwithstanding that the necessary consent to the institution of proceedings for the offence has not been obtained.

Amendment of S.I. 1998/1643

6. The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and Serbia (Freezing of Funds) Regulations 1998(4) are amended, by the substitution for the words "not exceeding the statutory maximum" in regulation 4(2) of the words "not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale".

Regulation 4

SCHEDULEINFORMATION

1.-(1) The Treasury (or any person authorised by them for that purpose either generally or in a particular case) may request any person in or resident in the United Kingdom to furnish to them (or that authorised person) any information in his possession or control, or to produce to them (or that authorised person) any document in his possession or control, which they (or that authorised person) may require for the purpose of ensuring compliance with the EC Regulation; and any person to whom such a request is made shall comply with it within such time and in such manner as may be specified in the request.

(2) Nothing in sub-paragraph (1) shall require any person who has acted as counsel or solicitor for any person to disclose any privileged communication made to him in that capacity.

(3) Where a person is convicted of an offence under this Schedule of failing to furnish any information or produce any document, the court may make an order requiring him, within such period as may be specified in the order, to furnish the information or produce the document.

(4) The power conferred by this paragraph to request any person to produce documents shall include power to take copies of or extracts from any document so produced and to request that person or, where that person is a body corporate, any other person who is a present or past officer of, or is employed by, the body corporate, to provide an explanation of any such document.

2. Any person who-

(a)without reasonable excuse, refuses or fails within the time and in the manner specified (or, if no time has been specified, within a reasonable time) to comply with any request made under this Schedule;

(b)intentionally furnishes false information or a false explanation to any person exercising his powers under this Schedule; or

(c)with intent to evade the provisions of this Schedule, destroys, mutilates, defaces, secretes or removes any document,

shall be guilty of an offence.

3. No information furnished or document produced (including any copy of an extract made of any document produced) by any person in pursuance of a request made under this Schedule shall be disclosed except:

(a)with the consent of the person by whom the information was furnished or the document was produced: provided that a person who has obtained information or is in possession of a document only in his capacity as servant or agent of another person may not give consent for the purposes of this sub-paragraph but such consent may instead be given by any person who is entitled to that information or to possession of that document in his own right; or

(b)to any person who would have been empowered under this Schedule to request that it be furnished or produced or any person holding or acting in any office under or in the service of the Crown in respect of the Government of the United Kingdom; or

(c)on the authority of the Treasury, to the Commission of the Communities or to any of the competent authorities of the Member States referred to in the EC Regulation, for the purpose of assisting the Commission or that competent authority to ensure compliance with the EC Regulation; or

(d)with a view to the institution of, or otherwise for the purposes of, any proceedings for an offence under these Regulations.

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations provide that any breach of Article 1 of Council Regulation (EC) No. 1607/98 of 24th July 1998 ("the EC Regulation") is to be a criminal offence. Article 1 prohibits the making of new investments in the Republic of Serbia except where authorisation has been granted in accordance with Article 2 of the EC Regulation. Regulation 3 of these Regulations provides that such authorisations are to be granted by or on behalf of the Treasury, and makes it an offence to provide false information in connection with a request for an authorisation.

These Regulations also make provision for information to be requested by or on behalf of the Treasury for the purposes of ensuring compliance with the EC Regulation, in accordance with Article 4 of that Regulation. Failure to provide such information, the provision of false information or the suppression of information is made a criminal offence.

Provision is also made with respect to penalties and proceedings for offences under the Regulations.

Finally, the Regulations make a minor amendment to the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and Serbia (Freezing of Funds) Regulations 1998.