By Eric Vincken
Successful start to the Twinning project in Croatia regarding training in European Union Law
Funded by the European Union’s Transition Facility Program for Croatia, CILC has started a new Twinning project titled “Enhancing the quality of judicial training – by upgrading EU law and on-line trainings”, with the project’s official kick-off taking place in Zagreb on 4 November 2016. The project, with a value of € 800.00,00 over a duration of 18 months, will be implemented in cooperation with the Judicial Academy of Croatia. In the project, CILC will cooperate with experts from the Study and Training Center for the Judiciary (SSR), the T.M.C. Asser Institute, as well as individual experts from the Lithuanian and Spanish judiciary, making it an example of a true European cooperation project. The Twinning team in Zagreb is headed by the official Resident Twinning Advisor Mr. Kestutis Vaskevicius, who in his home country of Lithuania is the deputy chairman of the National Courts Administration.
Within the scope of EU law, the aim of the project is to upgrade and improve the current judicial training system and to further enhance the lifelong learning scheme of judicial officials in Croatia. As the Assistant Minister of Justice Ms. Grubišin explained in her speech at the kick-off meeting, keeping pace with the developments in EU law will be a lifelong learning endeavor for the Croatian judiciary. The ever growing importance of EU law was also stressed by Justice Mr. Marc Fierstra from the Netherlands Supreme Court. This project is a successive part of various projects focused on strengthening the rule of law in Croatia, Ambassador Ms. Ellen Berends told the audience. The Member State Project Leader and CILC Deputy Director Mr. Eric Vincken explained that this is not CILC’s first project with the Croatian authorities and in particular the Judicial Academy and said the CILC is keen to continue the cooperation with Croatia. As stated by the Director of the Judicial Academy Ms. Andrea Posavec Franić, the Judicial Academy of Croatia is very much looking forward to implementing this important Twinning project.
