On 7 March, CEPOL issued a joint statement on behalf of the Justice and Home Affairs EU Agencies supporting the work of EU institutions and Member States as they helped Ukraine and its people. As a first step, and engaging within the scope of its mandate, CEPOL delivered from 11 March to 25 April 2022 a series of five webinars to help brace for the impact of the Ukrainian conflict on the work of EU law enforcement officials, with special attention to fundamental rights’ aspects. This series of webinars stirred vast interest and drew more than 1,000 participants.
CEPOL is currently conducting a training needs analysis on the impact of the war in Ukraine. Data gathering took already place via online survey between 30 April and 31 May from strategic and operational level actors. The report is being finalised and will be published during the second half of 2022.
CEPOL has been engaging with the Commission's Directorate-General for Justice, the European Union Advisory Mission (EUAM) Ukraine, and Ukrainian counterparts on various aspects of potential training for Ukrainian authorities upon a request by the Ukrainian Ministry of Justice for a number of specialized forensic trainings and with the Council of Europe for potential open-source intelligence training for Ukraine. Furthermore, CEPOL is examining the possibilities of launching a new project of learning communities to assist Ukraine, Moldova and adjacent Member States, with the objective of bringing Ukrainian and European Union law enforcement agencies closely together in fighting serious and organised crime and corruption while protecting victims and EU funds. By using the learning community methodology, law enforcement and justice sector practitioners will engage with civil society and non-state institutions, such as non-governmental and international organisations or academia, to learn from each other and share knowledge and good practices.
Moldova and Ukraine are beneficiary countries of the capacity-building project TOPCOP, implemented by CEPOL. The Russian aggression against Ukraine has affected the project’s business continuity. In order to ensure the continued participation of both countries in this EU external-funded project, CEPOL has been addressing some emerging needs since the start of the Russian aggression against Ukraine:
- In Moldova, TOPCOP is supporting the assessment of the law enforcement educational system focused on enhancing institutional capacity, which later will be included in the Multiannual Institutional Agenda Development Strategy that will present an overview of the reformed agenda. This assessment will provide an overview of the current situation and will enable a set of recommendations to the Ministry of Internal Affairs to develop a roadmap with clear objectives in the area of law enforcement educational system. In the long term, an improved educational system will represent the baseline for Ministry of Internal Affairs to fight against organised crime. In this regard, CEPOL set up the expert team conducting an analysis of the Ministry of Internal Affairs’ educational system. The final report was delivered to the Moldovan partners for endorsement. Additionally, CEPOL organised a study visit in Lithuania with a focus on cross-border cooperation and facilitation of illegal immigration, and hosted Moldovan partners in the sub-regional course “Facilitation of illegal immigration – human rights compliant interview techniques”. To support this country in the field of cyber-attacks, TOPCOP has also organised three webinars in the field of Cyber investigations utilising OSINT tools, Dark web and ATM hacking.
- In Ukraine, CEPOL intends to organise, in cooperation with Europol and Member States, a training course about war crime investigation by the end of 2022.
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