EU Criteria in the domain of the Rule of Law and the Fight against Corruption

Ladies and gentlemen,

It is an honour and a pleasure to address your assembly today.

I
am particularly pleased to present the EU criteria covering rule of law
and the fight against corruption. The topic is at the very heart of the
EU integration process.

Last week Transparency International
published the 2014 Corruption Perceptions Index in which BiH was ranked
80th of 174 countries, together with El Salvador, Mongolia, Morocco and
Benin. Comparing to 2013, BiH was downgraded by eight positions, and it
is among worse-ranked countries of the region. It is important to note
the Corruption Perception Index draws on surveys and assessments from
six  institutions: Bertelsmann Foundation, World Bank, World Justice
Project, Economist Intelligence  Unit, Global Insight and Freedom House.

The reference to the rule of law and the fight against corruption is repeated times and time again, sometimes like a mantra.

I
will try to demonstrate that these are concrete, tangible and
deliverable issues. I will mainly focus on the fight against corruption,
as it is the main reason for our gathering here today.

The
legislation governing corruption applicable in the EU (commonly referred
to as the EU acquis) is predominantly based on the compliance of the EU
Member States with international obligations. In this respect, a series
of Conventions (mostly in the framework of the UN and the Council of
Europe) are binding to all signatories and form an integral part of the
acquis.

Such requirements are often referred to as part of the “soft” acquis.

From
a strict EU perspective, the Commission Decision of 6 June 2011,
establishing an EU Anti-corruption reporting mechanism for periodic
assessment is a good indicator of the fact that corruption has become
and will continue to be a top priority in the EU.

In addition, a
series of Council Decisions and Directives touch upon the fight against
corruption in a variety of fields. This is notably the case in the area
of public procurement, the private sector and public service contracts.

This is what we call the “hard” acquis.

Let's
now turn to Bosnia and Herzegovina specifically. I would first
emphasise the long lasting commitment of the European Union to provide
all the necessary support to the BiH authorities in helping the country
to move  on the EU integration path. This has in part been emphasised by
my colleague Melvin Asin in his opening remarks this morning.

We
welcome the focus put by political parties in BiH on EU issues during
the current process of formation of governments. We know that the
overwhelming majority of citizens in BiH support the country joining the
EU, and it is right that the political system reflects voters’
priorities.

It is however crucial that this verbal commitment turns into concrete actions in the months and years ahead.   

In
every country the EU always works with the institutions of the country
and the duly elected officials, the stakeholders – especially civil
society – and of course we reach out to the citizens as well.

We will continue to do so because EU integration is a matter for the whole of society.

The
fundamental policy of the EU towards BiH remains unchanged because it
is the same for all Enlargement Countries – we want the country to join
when it is ready and has met the necessary criteria.

The
stability of institutions, guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law,
respect for human rights and a well-functioning market economy are
amongst the so called Copenhagen Criteria for accession that were also
promoted as core values in the founding Treaties of the EU and are
essential to its functioning.

Fighting Corruption in potential
candidate and candidate countries has, as part of rule of law efforts,
become a top priority for the EU and represents a very important aspect
of the accession process (Chapter 23).

This is evidenced by the
massive financial and technical support that the EU is providing to
Bosnia and Herzegovina in the fight against corruption, again as
mentioned earlier by  my colleague in his presentation.

Indeed,
without an effective fight against corruption as part of the broader
concept of rule of law the conditions for EU accession cannot be
successfully met.

This is the lesson learned from the last two
rounds of EU enlargement, and it has been regularly mentioned by the
yearly progress reports that the solid track record of investigation,
prosecution and adjudication of corruption cases is the baseline for
measuring the success.
In addition, the fight against corruption was
made one of the top priorities in the framework of the visa
liberalization roadmap.

In the larger context of pre-accession, a new approach has been developed by the European Commission as of 2011.

Allow me at this point of this presentation to expand a bit more on that aspect.

The
new approach is based on lessons learned during the negotiations with
Croatia and on the specific characteristics of Chapter 23 (Judiciary and
fundamental rights) and Chapter 24 (Justice, freedom, security), where
the above-mentioned  track-record is considered essential for closing
the negotiations.  

The new approach consists of the following elements:
 
–
First, the purpose of the new approach is to give the candidate
countries maximum time to produce a solid track record. In practice,
chapters 23 and 24 will be among the first to be opened and the last to
be closed.

– Second, there will be a reinforced negotiating scheme.
 
Following
the presentation of the screening report, candidate countries will
submit detailed action plans. These will represent the opening benchmark
necessary for an opening EU negotiating position to be agreed. The
opening negotiating position will set interim benchmarks which will be
closely linked to actions and milestones in the action plans.

–
The actions plans will represent the “roadmap” of the negotiations. The
Commission will submit to Member States monitoring tables twice a year
to update the Council on the advancement of negotiations on Chapters 23
and 24. In case of problems in the course of the negotiations, the
Commission will propose to the Council corrective measures. These may
include amendments and/or additions to the action plans.
In case of
delays in the implementation of the action plans, in order to ensure the
overall balance of the negotiations, the Commission can also decide to
stop technical work on negotiations on other chapters. In that case, the
Commission will swiftly inform the Council.

– Finally, the
Commission will use the meetings of the Stabilisation and Association
bodies to set up specific follow on measures.
 
They will take the form of specific information sessions on the state of advancement of negotiations on Chapters 23 and 24.

In
addition, specific incentives and support measures will be identified
in order to help candidate countries to fulfil their commitments taken
in the Action Plans.

Let me now stress the complementarity between the prevention and the repression aspects of the fight against corruption.

Indeed,
the prevention aspect is sometimes underestimated. Appropriate
legislation providing incentive to report corruption, and to increase
the costs of corrupt behaviours and make the latter ones harder to
materialise is indeed equally important as strong penal sanctions.

In
this context, I need to emphasis the crucial role to be played by the
anti-corruption agency and the preventions bodies at Entity, Brcko
District and cantonal level.

To sum up, in very concrete terms,
key indicators for progress are already and will continue to be closely
monitored. We are talking about:

• The establishment and
functioning of an efficient and effective anti-corruption agency and
anti corruption prevention bodies at all level ;

• The
specialisation of prosecution, Law enforcement Agencies and courts in
anti-corruption matters, and sufficient exchange of information;

•
An increase in the number of detected and resolved conflict of interest
cases; a pro-active use of asset declarations to detect cases of
inexplicable wealth, including within the judicial structures;

•
An increase in the number of successful investigations, prosecutions,
and final court verdicts in cases of serious and high level corruption;

•
Systematic launching of financial investigations in parallel to
criminal investigations on corruption and other  related crimes;

• And finally, an increased trend of criminal assets being confiscated, including in cases of corruption.

As a conclusion,

A
legal and institutional framework to fight corruption may look perfect
on paper. However, this requires a clear political will to effectively
implement such framework. If there is no political will there will be no
tangible results.

The new approach in relation to Chapters 23
and 24 is precisely established to move away from a ‘box ticking’
approach towards an approach which requires effective and lasting
results.

A classical criminal law approach in the fight against
crime and corruption has to be complemented with a more innovative and
effective approach focussing on financial investigations, aiming at
discovering and confiscating the money flows behind the crimes.

I
thank you for your attention and hope that the EU accession process,
like in most other candidate and potential candidate countries will
serve as an impetus for radical changes.