by Eric Vincken
On 14 and 15 November 2017, the closing conference of the IPA2014 project ‘International Cooperation in Criminal Justice: Prosecutors’ Network of the Western Balkans’ took place in Berlin. Representatives from the beneficiaries’ public prosecution offices, ministries of justice, EUROJUST, the European Judicial Network in Criminal Matters, the European Commission, GIZ, the German Ministry for Development Cooperation (BMZ), the project teams and some other representatives such as the German and Netherlands prosecution offices and the Ministry of Justice and Security discussed the project outputs, assessed their impact on the political and legal context and deliberated on remaining challenges. The beneficiary representatives very much appreciated the project’s support in general as well as the permanent advice by the various country teams. In particular, they thanked the project for the numerous capacity building measures and the operational support provided to more than 365 international criminal investigations. The support to assisting the Western Balkans region in fighting organized crime by GIZ and CILC will continue under the Western Balkans Counter Serious Crime Initiative as of 1 January 2018.”
