I would like to start by thanking the organisers for this timely conference and for giving me the opportunity to outline some ideas for possible concrete follow-up activities upon which the international community could focus its collective efforts.

I appreciate and welcome the commitment of the countries of the region to strengthen their efforts for this important fight.

As well, I appreciate the offer of the European Union, its institutions and Member States to support countries of South Eastern Europe.

The support of the United States, Canada, and other non-EU members present today is also essential to our efforts.

In my short presentation I will speak wearing both my hats - as Special Co-ordinator of the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe and as SECI Co-ordinator.

The first lesson that all of us here have learned from our experience in this field is that poor institutions in terms of legal basis, training, staffing and equipment make poor combatants in our fight against organised crime. These deficiencies must be rectified with longer-term training and technical assistance as well as shorter-term tactical assistance.

I propose, therefore, four tangible ideas to address these weaknesses.

First, one of my core goals this year has been to take the fight against organized crime closer to the region. To do this, we are now establishing in Bucharest a Secretariat for the Stability Pact Organized Crime initiative. This Secretariat will ensure co-ordination with the Bucharest based Crime Fighting Centre. It will also be tasked to implement, together with partners from the region and the wider international community, both National Action Plans and a Regional Action Plan to combat organised crime.

These plans, highlights of which I have shared with our hosts during the preparations for this Conference, contain concrete measures and priorities. I anticipate reporting the first results of these efforts in the next few months.

Another important objective of mine has been to provide a tool kit for regional cooperation in this vital area. We have sought to follow up the establishment of Police Officer Networks by holding a number of training modules in priority areas for combating organised crime.

Now, I think it is time for the next step, which is to help standardize training at a high level. I would like to pick up on a proposal by the Ministers of Interior of the South East European Cooperation Process approving the creation of an Association of South Eastern European Police Colleges. The Stability Pact can help make this idea a reality. This training on a roaming basis is the most promising approach as experience in the European Union and the accession countries shows.

My third proposal refers to the real operational fight against organised crime. Looking at the situation as it is, we have Europol as the European Union law enforcement organisation that handles criminal intelligence. Its aim is to improve the effectiveness and co-operation between the competent authorities of the Member States in preventing and combating serious international organised crime.

Europol's mission of targeting criminal organisations is a difficult task and I congratulate the Europol Director, Mr. Shorleck, for his achievements. However, and I am asking this as a serious question, how can we be successful when we are not able to work directly with similar agencies in a neighboring region so closely tied to the Union?

One answer is to refer to the Regional Trans-border Crime Fighting Centre in Bucharest. This Centre has been operational since early 2001, and I think we are all aware that it is a success story of regional ownership. But it has its limitations, which need to be corrected.

Until now the Bucharest Centre has operated separately from Europol, although one EU-Member State, the incoming EU presidency Greece, a number of candidate countries such as Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Slovenia and Turkey, as well as all the SAp countries are members in Bucharest.

For the future it will be critical to forge closer links between the Centre and Europol, the European Commission and the EU member states.

Concretely, this means providing advice to the Centre on crime-fighting strategies, on criminal analysis, and the start of real investigative cooperation by exchanging information on a case-by-case basis.

The Centre, despite its operational advantages, is in need of urgent help on its way to full European engagement. But this is not a one-way street - it is not a donor-recipient relationship. The Centre has much to offer Europol and the EU as well, perhaps most immediately in the area of falsification of the Euro, which helps fuel organized crime activities.

My fourth and final suggestion, therefore, is that we use this Conference to provide the political backing to enhanced EUROPOL-Bucharest Centre cooperation. The Centre could act as the operational arm of Europol and the EU in SEE.

With support from the Danish and Greek EU Presidencies, we could achieve early results which I would report to the Thessaloniki Conference in June. And to keep us all honest, I would propose a more comprehensive review of achievements by the end of 2003, under the Italian EU presidency.

I had promised to be short, so let me end with these comments: We have had enough of the theory of combating organised crime and it is time that all of us focus on the practice. We have an EU law enforcement agency - EUROPOL, and a SEE regional law enforcement agency - the Bucharest Centre. We need to get these two agencies to support each other: EUROPOL to bring the Centre closer to European standards - the Centre to focus its operational activities in the region to support EUROPOL, as well as the police forces of the European states.

We have an EU-agreed strategy to fight organised crime - the SPOC Action Plan, which needs to be implemented without further delay. There is no need for new mechanisms or instruments - we have the tools, such as the SPOC Secretariat, all we have to do is use them. You in this room have the authority to put both these suggestions into action.

I cannot guarantee that we will win the war against organised crime, but with your unqualified support I can be sure that we will certainly start winning more battles.

Thank you.