On 21 April 2020, The European Union and Council of Europe’s Horizontal Facility II “Action against Economic Crime in Albania” using a video-conferencing facility undertook a needs assessment on “Improving the Audit and Integrity of Public Officials in Albania” .

Council of Europe secretariat and expert discussed with representatives of the Department of Administration, Transparency and Anticorruption (DATAK) at the Prime Minister’s Office the operational mechanisms and capacities of DATAK to increase the efficiency of administrative investigations on corruption in public administration.

The aim of this activity is to strengthen the institutional framework on internal control mechanisms and to improve the oversight capacities on prevention of corruption.

The participants shared practical information on the organisation and functioning of the DATAK, challenges encountered in the coordination with other similar executive anti-corruption structures, the performance of audits and best practices based on the thematic inspections carried out lately in order to better assess beneficiaries’ needs.

The Action against Economic Crime in Albania will continue to support DATAK with the necessary guidance and develop a manual on integrity and audit of public officials. As a follow up to this activity, in cooperation with the Albanian School of Public Adminsitration, a training on audit and oversight of anti-corruption measures in the public administration for inspectors is planned to take place as soon as the restrictions related to COVID-19 are lifted.