Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano and Australian Minister for Home Affairs Jason Clare said July 17 an Australian Customs and Border Protection Service officer was seconded to the U.S. CBP. The Australian CBP officer will be seconded to the U.S. CBP Office of Intelligence and Investigations Liaison and the International Targeting Center. The officer’s role will focus on the joint targeting and analysis of criminal syndicates and the establishment of a Collaborative Targeting Framework between the U.S. and Australia. “The Australian and United States Customs and Border Protection agencies work very closely together," said Clare. "This is the next step. Embedding our experts inside United States Customs and Border Protection will improve our ability to target the activities of potential terrorists, drug smugglers and other organised criminals who try to target Australia." The countries previously outlined the plans for the U.S. and Australia to increase their capacity to identify high risk actors and activities at the earliest point possible.

CBP is requesting comments by Sept. 18 for an existing information collection concerning applications for CBP security IDs. CBP proposes to extend the expiration date of this information collection with no change to the burden hours or to the information collected. The notice ran in the Federal Register July 20.

CBP will host a trade forum on Fines, Penalties and Forfeitures (FP&F) at 10 a.m. PST July 26, CBP said in a public bulletin. The forum will be at 25 Harbor Plaza, Long Beach, Calif. 90802. The presentation will be conducted by Robert Thierry, director of FP&F and Jeff DeHaven, deputy director of FP&F.

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is seeking volunteers to participate in the document imaging system trial, said CBP in a CSMS message. The pilot allows importers and brokers that use ACE to submit official CBP documents and specified Participating Government Agency (PGA) forms via the Electronic Data Interchange (EDI).

CBP released a draft of discussion items from the Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations (COAC) working group on residue. Several issues are discussed in the draft, including bonds and a carrier’s ability to determine quantity and value. These issues and others will be discussed at the Aug. 15 COAC meeting in Seattle. See future issues of ITT for further coverage of the the draft.

CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related issues:

A listing of recent antidumping and countervailing duty messages from the International Trade Administration posted to CBP's web site as of July 18, along with the case number(s) and CBP message number, is provided below. The messages are available by searching on the listed CBP message number at http://addcvd.cbp.gov. (CBP occasionally adds backdated messages without otherwise indicating which message was added. ITT will include a message date in parentheses in such cases.)

CBP recently posted revised versions of its informed compliance publications entitled "Hand Tool Sets Classified Within Subheadings 8205.90.00 and 8206.00.00" (here) and "Distinguishing Bolts from Screws" (here). CBP said there were no substantive changes made to the revised versions.

CBP posted its textile and apparel enforcement statistics through the first two quarters of fiscal year 2012. Textiles and apparel seized in the first two quarters for intellectual property rights violations fell about 30% from the same period in 2011. Total value of such IPR seizures fell by about 41%. The value of all types of commercial fraud penalty actions is well above the corresponding period in 2011, even though the number of 2012 actions is about half those in the first two quarters of 2011.

CBP released its July 13 Customs Bulletin (Vol. 46, No. 29). While the Bulletin does not contain any ruling articles, it does list recent information collections and Court of International Trade decisions.