UK support for Macedonia in financial investigations
British Embassy Skopje launches project support for Macedonian institutions for leading financial investigations.
Signing Memorandum of Understanding for support of Macedonian capacities for leading financial investigations.
Using British skills and experience Macedonia will work on enhancing the capacity of the Macedonian Public Prosecutors and Financial Police in fighting financial crime and working on financial investigations. The support comes through a new project that was launched by the British Embassy on 25 June in Skopje.
The Memorandum of Understanding was signed by the British Ambassador Christopher Yvon, together with Marko Zvrlevski, Head Public Prosecutor and President of the Association of Public Prosecutors of the Republic of Macedonia and Aleksandar Trgacevski, Director of the Financial Police Office of Macedonia.
Speaking at the event Ambassador Yvon said:
The current global financial climate places a premium on efforts to tackle financial crime, and this is a challenge facing many countries. Moreover, efforts to protect states’ resources can be of benefit to individuals through unlocking greater availability of financial assets to help support areas such as health, education and job creation. I would like to congratulate the Public Prosecutor and the Financial Police for recognising this as a common challenge and for their own engagement.
The goal of the project is to enhance the capacity of the Macedonian Public Prosecutors and Financial Police Office to use financial investigation techniques and capabilities to track and recover assets and proceeds obtained with crime. It is in line with the EU Accession Partnership which outlines a series of priorities to be addressed in the area of fighting organised crime and corruption, including establishing a sustained track record on the implementation of judiciary reforms, and reforms within the prosecution service.
The project will be implemented by the Association of Public Prosecutors of the Republic of Macedonia and the Financial Police Office of Macedonia in the period from June 2013 to March 2014.