Bosnia customs official Emica Pezo charged with concealing 370,000 KM

A court in Bosnia and Herzegovina confirmed an indictment against Emica Pezo, a civil servant of the Uprava za indirektno oporezivanje (UIO). The indictment alleges that between November 2017 and October 2019 she used her official user account to record unpaid import duties as paid, despite knowing the money had not been transferred.

The falsified entries allowed freight forwarder "Jarkić" to hide obligations amounting to about 369,466 KM. The system automatically assigned a verification code “R”, indicating the duties were settled, so UIO did not activate the bank guarantees that would have secured payment. Later, UIO managed to recover 183,050 KM through a protest of the guarantees, leaving roughly 186,415 KM unpaid and causing a loss to the state budget.