FTA관세법상 원산지증빙서류 관련 벌칙규정 개정의 시사점 및 입법적 개선방안

Abstract

Under the Act on Special Cases of the Customs Act for the Implementation of Free Trade Agreements(hereinafter referred to as the ‘FTA Customs Act’), there are many penalty provisions on document evidencing origin. According to the Korea Customs Service, there were many cases in which Article 44 (2) 1 of the FTA Customs Act and Article 44 (3) of the same Act became issues. Due to the recent revision of the FTA Customs Act, the phrase “negligent” has been added to the main text of Article 44 (3) and has been in effect since January 1, 2020, and it is meaningful that in principle, “Any person who applies for and obtains or prepares and issues a document evidencing origin referred to in any agreement or FTA Customs Act by negligent misrepresentation” shall be punished. Prior to such an amendment, there was confusion as opinions on whether only intentional offenders can be punished, both intentional and negligent offenders can be punished by the relevant regulations, and there was also a fact that this was pointed out in an internal audit of the Korea Customs Service. However, with the above revision, it is now clear that only negligent offenders can be punished. Therefore, the question of how to deal with “the case of deliberately preparing and issuing documents evidencing origin differently from the facts,” which is more likely to be criticized than that, remains. For the systematic interpretation of the punishment, it can be seen that it is included in the case of “application, preparation, or issuance of evidence of origin by fraud or other improper means” of Article 44 (2) 1 of the FTA Customs Act, which is more serious than Article 44 (3) of the FTA Customs Act. In this regard, this study pointed out that it is a problem to use the variable and ambiguous expression of ‘fraud or other improper means’ in regulating the act of ‘writing and issuing documents evidencing origin’, and suggested legislative improvement measures. Meanwhile, in the case of goods exported or reported as imports before January 1, 2020, research and review on the direction of interpretation under the old law are still necessary, even though Article 44 (3) of the FTA Customs Act has been revised. In this respect, this study reviewed the differences between “A person who applies for and obtains or prepares and issues a document evidencing origin by fraud or other improper means” and “A person who applies for and obtains or prepares and issues a document evidencing origin by misrepresentation” by referring to other tax laws and rulings.