The 7th Tripartite (China-Korea-Japan) Customs Enforcement and Intelligence Working Group Meeting was held in Shenyang, China from May 8 to 9, 2018. Delegates from the three Customs’ law-enforcement departments attended the meeting.

This Meeting focused on issues of three parties’ common concerns such as the anti-smuggling of solid wastes, illicit drugs, endangered species products and gold, and anti-commercial fraud. A number of consensuses have been reached, including joint action to combat solid waste smuggling, the establishment of a new mechanism for intelligence and data exchange among the three parties to support the construction of "Smart Smuggling Suppression", the exchange of price information in tax-related cases, and cooperation in individual cases of smuggling gold, drugs and ivory.

China Customs’ anti-smuggling department has been developing international law-enforcement cooperation for a long time, insisting on promoting international cooperation through cases cooperation, and feeding back cases with international cooperation. In recent years, China Customs’ anti-smuggling department has actively cooperated with relevant departments of Korea Customs and Japan Customs to create new breakthroughs in anti-smuggling activities involving drugs, gold and solid wastes. For example, in the case of "3.21" outbound smuggling gold which was investigated by Shenyang Anti-Smuggling Bureau, China Customs not only exchanged information with Japan Customs through international enforcement cooperation, capturing criminal suspects and seizing 45.52 kilograms of smuggled gold, but also obtained a large number of key evidences through mutual criminal judicial assistance, which greatly promoted the investigation and trial of the case. It is for the first time that China Customs obtained evidences from Japan through mutual criminal judicial assistance.

This meeting was at the right time. On May 9, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe jointly held the 7th China-Korea-Japan Leaders’ Meeting in Tokyo. As an integral part of the three countries’ economic security and trade cooperation, the 7th Tripartite (China-Korea-Japan) Customs Enforcement and Intelligence Working Group Meeting had special significance, which has become a milestone in the law-enforcement cooperation among the three countries’ Customs.