Notification to the Parties

CONCERNING:

Fraudulent use of permits and certificates

1. The Secretariat has noted an increasing sophistication in recent cases of forgery and fraudulent use of CITES permits and certificates. In particular, several cases have been discovered where attempts have been made to give credence to high-quality forgeries by the placing on them of genuine security stamps removed from genuine permits.

2. The new security stamps are resistant to removal and this should help prevent such abuse. The Secretariat believes, however, that it may be useful to remind Parties that application of the correct procedures for controlling permits and certificates is possibly the best way to combat such fraud. The procedure required by the Convention is as follows. At the time of import, the original copy of a permit or certificate should be collected by Customs or other border control authorities and endorsed to show completion of the trade. The document should then be forwarded to the relevant CITES Management Authority.

3. The above procedure is additionally required to enable the accurate recording of imports of specimens of CITES-listed species.