Ministry of Interior hosted the Annual AFCOS Seminar in Sofia from 24 to 26 September 2014

From 24 to 26 September this year Sofia hosted the 2014 AFCOS Seminar

The European Anti-Fraud Office chose Bulgaria as a host of the event this year. The Seminar is an important forum and an excellent opportunity to discuss, share best practices and strengthen cooperation with OLAF and the foreign partner Services.

Representatives from OLAF, AFCOS Services in Italy, Estonia, Croatia, Romania and Portugal, as well as representatives from Albania, Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey, Bosna and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Montenegro attended the event. Officials from AFCOS Directorate – Ministry of Interior, Certifying Authority, Managing Authority of the Administrative capacity Operational Programme and Prosecutor’s Office participated at the Seminar as representatives from the Republic of Bulgaria.

This year the scope of the event focused on candidate and potential candidate countries accessing the European Union.

The Deputy Minister of Interior, Mr. Philip Gounev, made an opening speech addressed to the participants. Mr Gounev presented the policy of the national authorities in Bulgaria and achievements in the field of the protection EU’s financial interests. The Deputy Minister paid attention to the role of the AFCOS Services, main tasks and the necessity for good cooperation among themselves and with the European Anti-Fraud Office.

The Director of the AFCOS Directorate, Mr. Borislav Hlebarov, presented the establishment and development of the Bulgarian Service for protection EU’s financial interests, main functions and tasks. The focus was on administrative checks conducted by AFCOS and the best practices in operational cooperation with OLAF.

Ms Charlotte Arwidi, Head of Unit Inter-Institutional & External Relations in OLAF, presented information about Update on the latest policy and legislative initiatives in the field of fight against fraud.

The representatives from Italy, Estonia, Croatia, Romania and Portugal presented their Services. The attention of the presentations was aim at the models of the Structures, their mission, the main functions and tasks. Experience, best practices and case examples of cooperation were shared.

The programme of the event included also discussions on the challenges facing AFCOS Services in the field of the protection the European Union’s financial interests.

The participants took part in group discussions during the second session of the event. The topics of the working groups were:

• Anti-fraud Strategy aimed at protection of the EU’s financial interests;
• Cooperation between OLAF and competent national authorities with regard to on-the-spot checks and the relevant legislative framework (Regulation 883/2013 and Regulation 2185/96);
•  Irregularity reporting: current challenges and envisaged changes for the new Programming Period 2014 – 2020 relevant to enlargement countries.