UK Offence Report

1 Any person who directly or indirectly infringes any of the following prohibitions in the EC Regulation: a…

regulation 2(1) of The Democratic Republic of Congo (Financing and Financial Assistance and Technical Advice, Assistance and Training) (Penalties and Licences) Regulations 2004

This offence was read from the text as made, and no revised version was available, so a later revocation could not be ruled out. Check the current text at legislation.gov.uk.

What the provision says

1 Any person who directly or indirectly infringes any of the following prohibitions in the EC Regulation:

a Article 1(a), prohibiting financing or financial assistance for any sale, supply, transfer or export of arms and related material of all types to any person, entity or body in the Democratic Republic of Congo; or

b Article 1(b), prohibiting the provision to any person, entity or body in the Democratic Republic of Congo of technical advice, assistance or training related to military activities; or

c Article 1(2), prohibiting the participation in activities which promote the transaction or activities referred to in Article 1(a) and 1(b); shall be guilty of an offence and may be arrested.

Text as made, from legislation.gov.uk. © Crown copyright, reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0. This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.

Who it binds, and what has to be proved

Binds
a person
Conduct
importing or exporting without authority
Fault element
Strict liability
Burden of proof
No statutory defence — prosecution proves everything

The prosecution must prove that the conduct happened. This is a strict liability offence as drafted: the provision uses no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence, so there is no need to show that a person meant to do it, knew about it, or was careless.

Intention, knowledge and carelessness are irrelevant to guilt. They may still matter a great deal to sentence.

The provision states no defence, so the prosecution bears the burden on every element of the offence.

Classifier’s reasoning: no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence in the offence or its provision; other provisions of the same instrument use a mens rea word while this one does not (the Cundy v Le Cocq contrast).

What would breach regulation 2(1)?

These are illustrations, not law. They are generated from the provision’s own words to show the shape of the offence. Whether any particular conduct is caught depends on the full text, on any amendment since, and on the facts.

  1. Moving the goods across the border under the Democratic Republic of Congo (Financing and Financial Assistance and Technical Advice, Assistance and Training) (Penalties and Licences) Regulations 2004 without the licence the instrument requires.
  2. Holding a licence for one consignment and using it for another.
  3. Sending goods in transit through the United Kingdom, where the provision catches transit as well as import and export.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Not determined
Maximum fine
Not determined
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

no penalty is stated in this instrument; it may be in the enabling Act, or in a general penalties provision this pass did not connect to the offence.

No penalty was determined from this instrument. It may be in the enabling Act, or in a general penalties provision this pass did not connect to the offence. Absence of a figure here is not evidence that the offence carries no penalty.

Sentencing

Offences of this kind are usually sentenced under the guidelines below. This is a mapping by subject, not a finding about this provision, and the links go to a search of the Sentencing Council’s own site.

Prosecution figures

No published per-offence figure was found for this provision, and it could not be matched to a Ministry of Justice offence code. Offences created by statutory instrument very largely do not have one. Absence of a figure is not evidence that the offence is unused.

Status and lifecycle

Current status
Status not determined
Made
2 February 2004
In force from
6 February 2004
Extent
Not stated

How this was established: read from the text as made; no revised version available, so later revocation could not be ruled out.

What the instrument is for

(This note is not part of the Regulations) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

These Regulations provide that breaches of certain provisions of Council Regulation (EC) 1727/2003 (“the EC Regulation”) are to be criminal offences. Regulation 2 creates penalties in respect of the following provisions of the EC Regulation: a Article 1(a), which prohibits the provision of financing or financial assistance for any sale, supply, transfer or export of arms and related material of all types to any person, entity or body in the Democratic Republic of Congo; and b Article 1(b), which prohibits the provision to the Democratic Republic of Congo of technical advice, assistance or training related to military activities; and c Article 1(2), which prohibits the participation in activities which promote the transactions or activities covered by Article 1(a) and 1(b). Regulation 3 provides for licensing of financing and financial assistance (for the sale, supply, transfer or export of arms and related material) and licensing of technical advice, assistance or training (related to military activities), and regulation 4 provides for enforcement and penalties for breach of the EC Regulation. A full regulatory impact assessment has not been provided for this instrument as it has no impact on the costs of business.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

Other offences in the same instrument

How this was identified as an offence

Everything above rests on the judgement that this provision creates a criminal offence, rather than mentioning one. That judgement is made by rule, from the words of the provision, and this is the rule that made it — with a confidence of 0.92.

Basis
the provision says a person is “guilty of an offence”
Confidence
0.92 of 1.00

A provision that states a penalty for an offence created elsewhere can read very like one that creates an offence, and the rules can mistake the one for the other. If the text quoted above sets a penalty for something made an offence by another provision, treat the classification on this page with that in mind, and read the instrument.

Check the source