LETTER FROM MINISTER LUKAČ TO THE CHIEF OF EU DELEGATION TO BIH
| Banja Luka | Friday, 04/09/2020
The Republic of Srpska Minister of the Interior, Mr Dragan Lukač, sent a letter to the Chief of the EU Delegation to BIH, Mr Johann Sattler, regarding the letter of the Minister of Security of BIH, Mr Selmo Cikotić, in which several false allegations were presented to the Deputy Executive Director of EUROPOL and Ambassador Sattler, all with the aim of blocking the establishment of Joint Focal Point of BIH for cooperation with EUROPOL.
‘The Republic of Srpska Ministry of the Interior is not going to accept the new arrangements for forming the new Joint Focal Point for cooperation with EUROPOL, since the only acceptable solution is strict and consistent application of the Agreement on operational and strategic cooperation with Europol, whose procedures and content itself are in absolute compliance with valid legislation in BIH’, Minister Lukač stated in his letter.
According to the information at disposal of the Republic of Srpska Ministry of the Interior, Minister Cikotić, in his letter to Ambassador Sattler, presented false allegations also regarding the Instruction on significant issues for the implementation of the Agreement on operational and strategic cooperation with Europol, from May 2020, saying that ‘it is not in accordance with BIH legislation or EU standards’, which is absurd, since it is the very Instruction that is in complete accordance with the Agreement itself as well as the valid legislation, and so far, it has been the only concrete step BIH took towards fulfilling the obligations foreseen by the Agreement.
Furthermore, Minister Lukač would like to remind Ambassador Sattler that the Agreement on operational and strategic cooperation with Europol was agreed upon by BIH delegation and Europol, with the consent of the Presidency of BIH, signed by the Minister of Security of BIH and the Director of Europol, and ratified by both European Parliament and the Presidency of BIH, with the consent of BIH Parliamentary Assembly.
Additionally, in his letter to Ambassador Sattler, Minister Lukač stated that the Joint Focal Point for cooperation with Europol cannot be located within the Directorate for coordination of police bodies of BIH, as claimed by Mr Cikotić, but within the Ministry of Security of BIH.
‘There is no adequate legal basis for this. According to the valid legal regulations in BIH and EU, Directorate has no legal competence necessary for active participation in exchanging information with Europol, and yet they do perform such activities. Also, Directorate has no access to the information necessary for cooperation with Europol, does not create or own operational police information, and particularly, they do not possess the operational competence to perform the investigations of criminal offences in the mandate of Europol, which is the actual point of cooperation with Europol’, Minister Lukač concluded in his letter to the Chief of the EU Delegation to BIH.
