Last week, the first meetings were held in Baku (Azerbaijan) with the General Prosecutor's Office of Azerbaijan – a beneficiary of a new European Union (EU) Twinning project implemented by the Special Investigation Service (STT). The meetings were attended by STT Director Žydrūnas Bartkus, who is the leader of this Twinning project, as well as two STT experts of this project.
“This Twinning project, which is already the seventh Twinning project being implemented by the STT, is an opportunity for Lithuania to share experience of Lithuanian and other EU Member States on the topic of recovery of property acquired through corruption. Asset recovery is also among the priorities of STT in 2022, when we will pay more attention to detecting and recovering such property to the State”, says Žydrūnas Bartkus, the project leader and STT director.
The aim of the project is to improve the efficiency of criminal justice through modernization of the asset recovery and management system in line with EU and international best practices, with a special focus on the return of corrupt assets to the State.
The project aims to strengthen the institutional and operational capacity of the Department for the Coordination of Special Confiscation Issues of the Prosecutor General's Office (DCSCI) to ensure that it fully fulfils its mandate in the area of criminal property detection, tracking and recovery as well as asset management. National legislation will be reviewed or developed to provide the widest possible range of legal measures to facilitate the recovery of proceeds of corruption. A separate, standalone asset recovery strategy and related actions that intensify the fight against corruption and build more effective anti-corruption chains will be developed.
In addition to the STT, which will be leading authority in implementing the project, the EU Twinning Project will involve 6 other Lithuanian institutions: the Supreme Court of Lithuania, the Prosecutor General's Office, the Ministry of the Interior, the Financial Crime Investigation Service under the Ministry of the Interior, the Lithuanian Criminal Police Bureau, State Tax Inspectorate under the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Lithuania.
The project is funded by the European Commission and will run for 24 months.
This is the seventh EU Twinning project being implemented by the STT and the second in Azerbaijan. The first EU Twinning project in Azerbaijan "Support for the Anti-Corruption Department with the Prosecutor General of the Republic of Azerbaijan" was successfully implemented in 2009-2011.
