Corruption, a serious crime

13/07/2012 00:00

The EURALIUS mission proposes essential changes in the legislation for
the Court of Serious Crimes, among which is the competency of this court
for treating money laundering cases and corruption, when related.

The EURALIUS expert, Pietro Spera, underlined that the money laundering can be divided in two categories: the money laundering in mitigating and aggravating circumstances and it cannot be investigated by a usual prosecution, but by the serious crimes.

“I would make a simple proposition. If you can, you can include the money laundering and corruption in the competency of serious crimes, because it results in many cases that corruption favors money laundering. We cannot think of an efficient war in this area if we don’t include corruption together with the money laundering crime at the Court of Serious Crimes. At this point maybe it will be possible to include some articles, and if this is related with the political will, then let us see the most serious corruption forms”, declared Pietro Spera, EURALIUS expert.

As regards the amends that should be made for the competences of the Court of Serious Crimes, the Head Prosecutor of Serious Crimes, Olsian Cela, declared that they should start initially with the name of this court.

“My opinion has been that the name of this court must change. It should be a Court for the Organized Crime, because this was the profile that it has had in the last 8 years. The organized crime keeps being a problem for the Albanian society, and it will still be a problem for our society, as for any other society in the world. These are problems related with development and that derive from many reasons. As such, the organize crime demands maximal attention and dedication. It requires specialized people and many instruments at its disposal”, Cela declared.

“We must give to the structures and institutions the real shape that they have. The Court of Serious Crimes and the Prosecution of Serious Crimes are committed today in the war against organized crime, and there is nothing wrong in this kind of name. At first glance it seems that nothing changes. It’s not only that, because from this derive many other duties and commitments. There could be many new concepts for the cooperation method”, declared Edmond Rizai, director of the Directory against Organized Crime.

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