Upon accession of Romania on 1 January 2007, certain weaknesses in the security system remained, as e.g. in the areas of judicial reform and the fight against corruption. Such weaknesses could prevent an effective application of EU and national laws, policies and programmes and prevent Romanians from enjoying their full rights as EU and Romanian citizens.

The purpose of the Thematic Fund Security is to address Schengen related issues and contribute to enhancing socially related security as well as to fighting against corruption and organized crime.

Romanian public and non governmental organisations active in the field of security, migration, anti trafficking, fight against corruption

Activities are primarily the implementation of 10 to 12 projects and joint projects between Swiss and Romanian institutions amounting from CHF 150’000 to CHF 1’970’000. Projects will support exchange of know-how, training, acquisition of material, institutional development.

Achieved results:  

The Thematic Fund ‘Security’ (TFS) has included a total of 19 projects for a total budget CHF 17,838,199.

The TFS is clustered into three sub areas, namely ”Schengen and Prüm related issues”, “Enhanced socially related security” and “fight corruption and organized crime”.

Three projects in the sub-area “Schengen and Prüm related issues” have been successfully implemented and have considerably contributed to Romania’s efforts to comply with the technical requirements for the accession to the Schengen area.

In the sub-area of the TFS on “Enhanced socially related security”, eight projects have been completed. Projects in that field helped

•  improving the bilateral knowledge and cooperation between Romanian local and central actors and Swiss and Romanian actors on counter-THB at both population and institutional level,
• increasing the security in rural areas of Romania,
• improving the capacity of the Romanian Gendarmerie in air rescue techniques and crowd control,
• boosting the application of alternative forms of sentences in Community Service Workshops,
• application of the new codes introduced in 2014.

Under the sub-area “fight corruption and organized crime”, eight projects have been implemented under the TFS. Projects in this domain helped Romania to

• strengthen the capacity of the National Agency for the Management of Seized Assets (ANABI),
• strenghten the operational capabilites of the Anticorruption General Direction (AGD) of the Ministry of Administration and Interior (MAI),
• support judges, prosecutors and the staff of the National Agency for Integrity (ANI) in the fight against corruption and economic crime,
• increase transparency by supporting investigative journalism in the country,
• strengthen the capacity of the public ministry to deliver better results in fighting petty corruption, economic and financial crime,
• increase the effectiveness of anti-corruption policies and prevention mechanisms in public procurements, targeting mainly local authorities.

Phase 1 01.04.2011 - 31.12.2019   (Completed)