Last week, on 28 November, the international seminar "Current Events of Combating Fraud of Structural Funds of the European Union" was held. The seminar covered not only the current events of the field, but also the main problematic issues, trends and observations at the local and international level. The seminar was organized by the officials of the State Police Economic Crime Combatting Department within the framework of the European Economic area grant 2014-2021 programme “International Police Cooperation and Combating Crime” project No.EEZ/VP/2020/1 “Support to the State Police for increasing effectiveness and quality of economic crime investigation in Latvia””.
The investigation of crimes of fraud of the European Union (EU) structural funds is one of the pillars that directly refers to the country's reputation on a global scale, so the main thing is to learn from successful examples of practice and promote inter-institutional cooperation. Participants of the seminar represented 10 different law enforcement institutions in Latvia - the State Police, the Financial Intelligence Service, the Ministry of Finance, the European Prosecutor's Office, the Central Finance and Contracts Agency, the Prosecutor's Office of the Republic of Latvia, the Rural Support Service, the Competition Council, the Ministry of Justice and the association "Cooperation Council of Agricultural Organizations". Taking into account the fact that the crimes of fraud of EU structural funds are of an international nature, delegated experts from Lithuania, Estonia, the Netherlands and Ukraine had also arrived. In total, 90 participants participated in the seminar in person, while 246 participants connected remotely.
Pauls Krūmiņš, the Head of the State Police Central Criminal Police Department Economic Crime Combatting Department indicated: "Our goal is to prevent the reduction of the competitiveness of the Republic of Latvia in the international environment and weakening of the well-being of our society, and by fighting both corruption and fraud, we can strengthen both Latvia and our nation in this way."
The topics of the lectures were mainly aimed directly at the exchange of experience and strengthening of cooperation between local and international institutions. For example, the Rural Support Service shared its experience in the fight against fraud and highlighted its anti-fraud policy and regulatory framework, while the Financial Intelligence Service called for even closer cooperation, outlining the opportunities available for cooperation. Foreign practice was shared by the delegated European Prosecutor from Lithuania, who presented typologies of fraud embedded in EU-funded projects. The seminar also covered such topics as cartels in EU fund projects and the current events of detecting violations.
In addition to the seminar, a press conference was also held on the same day, where the media were informed about the main problematic issues and the most important observations when encountering and investigating such crimes in Latvia. The current work results and the updated information related to the crimes of fraud of EU structural funds were highlighted.
Seminar was organized within the framework of the European Economic area grant 2014-2021 programme “International Police Cooperation and Combating Crime” project No.EEZ/VP/2020/1 “Support to the State Police for increasing effectiveness and quality of economic crime investigation in Latvia”