Arguing before a British court that writs should not be legal, Otis said that with a writ, Custom-house officers may enter our houses when they please; we are commanded to permit their entry.
In Calais and other northern industrial ports, the French government has added hundreds of new customs officers. France also is testing a new electronic customs system.
After this story was published in The Associated Press, agriculture and customs officials in Ecuador announced in a statement that they had removed a government-run banana export database.
Customs officials say the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region saw its foreign trade increase by nearly six percent year on year in the first five months of this year.