68In those circumstances, to accept that the limitation period laid down in the fourth subparagraph of Article 3(1) of Regulation No 2988/95 does not begin to run until the administration has discovered those irregularities could encourage inertia on the part of the national authorities in bringing proceedings in respect of irregularities, whilst exposing operators, firstly, to a long period of legal uncertainty and, secondly, to the risk of no longer being in a position to prove at the end of such a period that the transactions in question were lawful (see, to that effect, judgments in Ze Fu Fleischhandel and Vion Trading, C‑201/10 and C‑202/10, EU:C:2011:282, paragraph 45, and Cruz & Companhia, C‑341/13, EU:C:2014:2230, paragraph 62).
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