Effective responses to transnational organised crime depend on stronger regional cooperation.

60 prosecutors, judges and law enforcement gathered in Cairo for a regional workshop on “Strengthening regional cooperation in criminal matters”, organised by the Council of Europe and the Public Prosecution Office of the Arab Republic of Egypt, on 21-22 October. The workshop provided a platform to exchange good practices, experiences, and ways to strengthen judicial cooperation across the Southern Mediterranean region.

 As Clau Neukirch, Director of the Directorate of Programme Co-ordination of the Council of Europe, mentioned in his welcoming speech “An effective criminal justice response rests on two foundations. The first is solid domestic legislation. The second is international co-operation that actually delivers: mutual legal assistance, extradition, joint investigations and asset recovery”.

The workshop addressed a set of emerging and cross-cutting typologies of organised crime that increasingly intersect with international cooperation. These include the manipulation of sports competitions and illegal or irregular betting; money laundering conducted through gambling and sports-betting channels; trafficking in stolen cultural property and artefacts; the seizure, freezing, and confiscation of crypto-assets, including Egypt's own experience in establishing a dedicated wallet for confiscated cryptocurrency; and cybercrime and intellectual-property enforcement against illegal sports-streaming and piracy networks.

The regional workshop is organised by the Council of Europe and the Public Prosecution Office of Egypt, under the South Programme VI "Strengthening Euro-Mediterranean legal space for shared prosperity and human security", a joint initiative of the European Union and the Council of Europe, cofinanced by the two organisations and implemented by the Council of Europe.