Lithuania will implement the European Union Twinning Project “Support to the reform of the criminal asset recovery and management system in Azerbaijan”. The Special Investigation Service of the Republic of Lithuania (as the Project Leader), together with six other Lithuanian institutions – the Supreme Court of Lithuania, the Prosecutor General's Office of the Republic of Lithuania, the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Lithuania, the Financial Crime Investigation Service under the Ministry of Interior of the Republic of Lithuania, the Lithuanian Criminal Police Bureau and the State Tax Inspectorate under the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Lithuania will be in charge of implementing this project.
The objectives of this project are to improve the efficiency of criminal justice through modernization of the asset recovery and management system in line with EU and international best practices and to strengthen the institutional and operational capacity of the Department for the Coordination of Special Confiscation Issues of the Prosecutor General's Office (DCSCI) in Azerbaijan to ensure that it fully fulfils its mandate in the area of criminal property detection, tracking and recovery as well as asset management.
The project aims at achieving the following results:
- Establishing a national Asset Recovery System (ARS) through strategic planning and improving the legal framework.
- Improving the institutional set-up and functioning of the DCSCI as a full-fledged national Asset Recovery Office.
- Improving internal and external cooperation.
- Increasing knowledge and skills required to effectively undertake asset recovery actions.
The Special Investigation Service of the Republic of Lithuania will be responsible for the successful implementation of the project and the Central Project Management Agency (CPMA), Lithuania, will ensure project administrative and financial management.
The total project budget is 1.500.000 EUR, which will be financed by the European Commission. The duration of the project is 24 months.
This is already the 7th EU Twinning Project won by the Special Investigation Service of the Republic of Lithuania and the 2nd in Azerbaijan. The first project “Support for the Anti-Corruption Department with the Prosecutor General of the Republic of Azerbaijan” was implemented in 2009-2011.
