(15) Whereas it is necessary to lay down who may lodge a countervailing duty complaint, including the extent to which it should be supported by the Community industry, and the information on countervailable subsidies, injury and causation which such complaint should contain; whereas it is also expedient to specify the procedures for the rejection of complaints or the initiation of proceedings; (16) Whereas it is necessary to lay down the manner in which interested parties should be given notice of the information which the authorities require, and should have ample opportunity to present all relevant evidence and to defend their interests; whereas it is also desirable to set out clearly the rules and procedures to be followed during the investigation, in particular the rules whereby interested parties are to make themselves known, present their views and submit information within specified time limits, if such views and information are to be taken into account; whereas it is also appropriate to set out the conditions under which an interested party may have access to, and comment on, information presented by other interested parties; whereas there should also be cooperation between the Member States and the Commission in the collection of information;
(17) Whereas it is necessary to lay down the conditions under which provisional duties may be imposed, including conditions whereby they may be imposed no earlier than 60 days from initiation and not later than nine months thereafter; whereas such duties may in all cases be imposed by the Commission only for a four-month period;
(18) Whereas it is necessary to specify procedures for the acceptance of undertakings eliminating or offsetting the countervailable subsidies and injury in lieu of the imposition of provisional or definitive duties; whereas it is also appropriate to lay down the consequences of breach or withdrawal of undertakings and that provisional duties may be imposed in cases of suspected violation or where further investigation is necessary to supplement the findings; whereas, in accepting undertakings, care should be taken that the proposed undertakings, and their enforcement, do not lead to anti-competitive behaviour;
(19) Whereas it is necessary to provide that the termination of cases should, irrespective of whether definitive measures are adopted or not, normally take place within 12 months, and in no case later than 13 months, from the initiation of the investigation;
(20) Whereas an investigation or proceeding should be terminated whenever the amount of the subsidy is found to be de minimis or if, particularly in the case of imports originating in developing countries, the volume of subsidized imports or the injury is negligible, and it is appropriate to define those criteria; whereas, where measures are to be imposed, it is necessary to provide for the termination of investigations and to lay down that measures should be less than the amount of countervailable subsidies if such lesser amount would remove the injury, and also to specify the method of calculating the level of measures in cases of sampling;
