The seminar, which assembled police officials from cantonal, entities and state-level law enforcement agencies in BiH, provided a platform for presentation of the activities implemented so far by Europol Section within the Directorate and the advantages in crime fighting by the use of Europol tools.
In his address, Deputy Director of Directorate Mile Jurić emphasised that establishing Europol must be solved in BiH. “We have to create conditions for signing the Operational Agreement with Europol soon. This is our priority. The Directorate's role as a single point of exchange of information on the strategic and operational level in international investigation and international police cooperation is clear. It is our objective to execute our duty efficiently on behalf of and to the benefit of all law enforcement in BIH.“
Europol is the European Union’s law enforcement agency whose main goal is to help achieve a safer Europe for the benefit of all EU citizens by assisting the European Union’s Member States in their fight against serious international crime and terrorism. The tools that the Europol members benefit from are: fast information exchange, sophisticated intelligence analysis, co–ordination, expertise and training.
“There is no doubt the BiH law enforcement would benefit greatly from such an efficient and coordinated support. It is therefore of high importance for the Directorate in close cooperation with the BiH Ministry of Security to continue towards complying with the remainder of requirements for signing of the Operational Agreement. In the end, not having a well functioning Europol in place endanger the safety and security of the people in BiH and other European countries”, said Pim Cappelle, Resident Adviser.
The participants have also had a chance to listen to the experiences of Dutch, Slovenian, and Polish colleagues in cooperating with Europol both in the home countries and in the Europol headquarters in the Hague, Holland. Thus, Head of the Dutch Desk in Europol Jelmer Visser, official of the Europol Dutch Desk Gerrit Jan Heijink, Head of International Operational Cooperation of Slovenian and Polish Police Dušan Kerin and Robert Zolkiewski respectively, shared a wealth of experience and knowledge with the BiH colleagues.
The seminar was organized as part of the Twinning Project “Assistance to the Directorate for Coordination of Police Bodies”, aimed at strengthening Directorate’s capacities in the international police cooperation.