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The Office of the High Representative together with the G. Marshall European
Center for Security Studies organized last week a five-day symposium, "The
Investigation, Coordination and Prosecution of Crimes of Fraud, Corruption
and Transnational Crime: Refining the Process, Enhancing the Results" in
Austria for officials from Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Judicial and law enforcement personnel, members of parliaments,
representatives of Ministries and faculty professors from both entities, 33
in total, participated in the event. The purpose of the symposium was to
refine the process and methodologies used to investigate and prosecute
crimes of fraud, corruption and transnational crime.
Experts from the United States, Germany, Italy and Sweden shared their
knowledge and experience with the BiH participant with respect to their own
models and measures against fraud and corruption.
The results of the symposium are the following recommendations:
Legal aspect
- Full implementation of existing laws;
- Speed up the process of criminal legal reform with respect to
special investigative methods to combat crimes of corruption, fraud, money
laundering and other organized crime cases.
Education
- Develop domestic dialogue to develop codes of conduct and guidelines
for various professions, such as prosecutors, judges, police, and finance
police, as well as media-judiciary relations.
- Develop workshops between entity ministries to discuss cooperation
and identify areas for legislative harmonization.
Transparency
- Public Prosecutor should regularly give statements to inform the
public on major corruption cases;
- Encourage transparency trough media access to government and the
judiciary in line with the Freedom of Information Act.
Cooperation and Coordination
- Designate an Inter-Ministerial Commission to develop cooperative
units to coordinate corruption and fraud offenses. Establish an Office of
Cooperation at the state level which could act on behalf of the state with
respect to international relations and international law enforcement
cooperation.
Political commitment
- The government needs to clearly demonstrate and cultivate political
will and support to seriously fighting crimes of corruption, fraud, and
money laundering.
- Review all applicable international agreements to sign and implement
those that directly effect investigating and prosecuting corruption and
money laundering, such as the Convention on Laundering, Search, Seizure of
Proceeds of Crime.
OHR Press Release, Sarajevo, 20 November 2000
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