Two consecutive workshops were held in Ankara on 9 and 10 May 2023 with the participation of fifty representatives from the Ministry of Justice, the Directorate General of Security, Gendarmerie General Command, the Ministry of Trade and the Ministry of Treasury and Finance, as well as judges and prosecutors from Ankara, Istanbul, Silvan, Bilecik and Izmir. 

The aim of the workshops was to exchange experience and provide good practices in the application of the existing informal cooperation mechanisms, which permit information to be obtained before and in preparation of mutual legal assistance (MLA) requests. In particular, international and national experts presented two documents they drafted under the project: “Guidelines outlining possible avenues for seeking informal international cooperation” as well as concrete “Standard Operating Procedures”, which establish concrete steps that must be taken by the relevant authorities to ensure that full use is made of the available sources of information in order to conduct efficient investigations.  

Following presentations on the challenges of international cooperation, on the national legal framework and on relevant international standards, representatives from different institutions discussed on their daily practices in their respective institutions during the pre-MLA phase. The workshops yielded fruitful results in reflecting the positions of the institutions and in enhancing cooperation between the authorities in charge of international cooperation in criminal matters. These were the first two workshops of this kind, out of four planned under the project. 

The project "Improving International Judicial Cooperation in Criminal Matters in Türkiye" is co-funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe, and implemented by the Council of Europe.