Two consecutive workshops were held in İstanbul on 22 and 23 February 2024 with the participation of 50 representatives from the Ministry of Justice, the Directorate General of Security, the Gendarmerie General Command, the Ministry of Trade and the Ministry of Treasury and Finance, as well as judges and prosecutors from Ankara, Istanbul, Silvan, Marmaris, Kilis and Izmir.
The aim of the workshops was to exchange experience and provide good practices in the application of the existing informal cooperation mechanisms, which permit information to be obtained before, and in preparation of, mutual legal assistance (MLA) requests. International and national experts presented documents which was drafted under the project, namely “Guidelines outlining possible ways for seeking informal international cooperation”, “Standard Operating Procedures”, and “Analysis of the Current Mechanisms for pre-MLA Cooperation and Information Sharing Used in Türkiye” which establish concrete steps that must be taken by the relevant authorities to ensure that full use is made of the available sources of information to conduct efficient investigations.
Following presentations on the challenges of international cooperation, the national legal framework and relevant international standards, representatives from different institutions discussed their daily practice in their respective institutions during the pre-MLA phase. The workshops yielded fruitful results in reflecting the positions of the institutions and enhancing cooperation between the authorities in charge of international cooperation in criminal matters. These were the third and fourth workshops of this kind, as two similar events were organised under the project in in Ankara on May 2023.
The project "Improving International Judicial Cooperation in Criminal Matters in Türkiye" is co-funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe and implemented by the Council of Europe.
Possible Pathways for Informal International Cooperation for Criminal Justice Authorities
