On 13-14th December 2018, the Romanian National Anti-Corruption Directorate (with the assistance of the Romanian Association for the Research of EU Criminal Law) organised the conference “The impact of the EPPO Regulation at the level of the national authorities of the participating EU Member States.” The HERCULE III Programme financially supported the conference. It took place in Bucharest and was part of the ongoing project “Promoting the protection of the financial interests of the EU by supporting the actions of the Member States and the European Institutions in the transition towards the EPPO.”

The event brought together representatives from the national prosecution offices, judges, academics, and members of the Associations for European Criminal Law and the Protection of Financial Interests of the European Union. It aimed to facilitate the sharing of experiences, challenges, and practices in order to prepare the EU and the national legal systems for the establishment of the EPPO.

The first part of the conference included presentations on the state of play of the implementation of the EPPO Regulation (Péter József Csonka, DG JUST), on OLAF support in EPPO investigation (Luca de Matteis, OLAF) and on the challenges of the implementation of the PIF Directive (Christoph Burchard, University of Frankfurt). The conference continued with presentations that focused on the study on the impact of the future EPPO on the Romanian judicial and legal system (Gheorge Bocsan, Prosecutor’s Office attached to the High Court of Cassation, Romania), on the relations between the national and European Prosecutors (Alberto Perduca, Chief Prosecutor, Italy) and on the reporting obligations and general cooperation between the national authorities and the EPPO (Emanuelle Wachenheim, Ministry of Justice, France).

Additional presentations addressed the issues of admissibility and freedom of circulation of evidence during the investigation and adjudication of the EPPO cases (John Vervaele, Utrecht University), cross-border investigations, cooperation within the EPPO and MLA in criminal matters with third countries (Filippo Spiezia, Vice-President of Eurojust), and the procedural guarantees and protection of human rights during EPPO investigations (Miguel Carmona, magistrate, Spain).

The last part of the conference was dedicated to a hypothetical case study (Alexandra Lancranjan, DNA, Romania), which was subsequently discussed in detail by the participants in different working groups.