FBI Officials Visited the SECI Center
BUCHAREST, September 16th – The SECI Center management welcomed today the FBI Assistant Director, Criminal Investigative Division, Kenneth W. Kaiser.
Discussions were held regarding ongoing cooperative efforts in the fight against international organized crime that impacts the citizens of the Balkan Region and the United States. AD Kaiser emphasized the importance of law enforcement cooperation that is necessary to keep pace with organized criminal groups that do not recognize international borders.
“It has been a great partnership and let me assure you of our decision to continue working together and supporting the SECI Center. The Center has the capacity to move things forward”, the FBI official declared.
The SECI Center director, Mitja Močnik thanked the FBI representative for the constant technical and professional support and presented the recent developments of the organization. “For the future we try to work better on joint investigations and to overcome the bureaucratic issues”. The deputy director, Ion Gabriel Sotirescu supported this idea. “
We have made significant steps in bringing together police and customs authorities from the member countries and efficiently work on common cases”.
Kenneth Kaiser was accompanied by Barry Braun, Section Chief within the Criminal Investigative Division. They also met officials of the Romanian National Police.
The SECI Regional Center for Combating Trans-border Crime, headquartered in Bucharest, Romania, was launched in 2000, and is a unique operational organization in which police and customs liaison officers from 13 member states (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Hungary, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia and Turkey) work together in direct cooperation, coordinate joint investigations and facilitate information exchange.
Besides the member countries, there are 21 observers, countries and organizations: Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Canada, EUBAM, France, Georgia, Germany, Israel, Italy, Japan, The Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Slovakia, Ukraine, UNDP Romania, the United Kingdom, UNMIK, and the United States of America.
Italy and the United States maintain permanent representation at the SECI Center, and Interpol and the World Customs Organization are permanent (non-resident) advisors to the SECI Center.
