6-8 February a first ever large-scale study tour of Ukrainian law enforcement agents took place to CITCO headquarters in Madrid. CITCO is an Intelligence Center for Counter-Terrorism and Organized Crime Over members of National Anticorruption Bureau of Ukraine, Special Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office, Assets Recovery and Management Agency, Security Service of Ukraine, National Police and Prosecutor General’s Office for 3 days had seminars, workshops and bilateral meetings with their Spanish counterparts, including national police and specialized prosecutor’s office. The main goal of the study tour – to share best practices of financial investigation related to off-shore activities, drugs, organized crime, corruption, as well as assets recovery investigations.
The study tour was jointly organized by EU Anti-Corruption Initiative (EUACI), EU Advisory Mission (EUAM), Intelligence Center for Counter-Terrorism and Organized Crime (CITCO) and EU Action against Drugs and Organised Crime (EU-ACT). It was also first of its kind joint cooperation between various EU projects and EUAM.
Apart from the theoretical seminars and workshops, the trip also had practical benefit – Ukrainian counterparts discussed a number of mutual legal assistance requests with their Spanish colleague s.
Commenting on this mission, Elena Konceviciute – senior anti-corruption expert of EUACI said: ‘It has taken Spain many years and lives of hundreds dedicated law enforcement officers to create a well-coordinated structure, CITCO, so that instead of competing against each other they have learned to work and help each other. They are now achieving excellent results in the fight against terrorism, organised crime and corruption. We have taken representatives from NABU, SAPO, ARMA, SBU, National police and PGO to learn from this excellent example so that they could see that by working together they could all win.’
