On Thursday, 19 September, the Saeima in the second and final reading adopted urgent draft law regarding amendments to the Agreement on Law Enforcement between the Government of the Republic of Latvia and the Government of the United States of America of September 2004.

“The adopted amendment will promote an even closer bilateral cooperation with the USA; furthermore, it will enhance the fight against money laundering and the financing of terrorism. It will also enable Latvia to implement the Moneyval recommendations by putting the relevant Latvian authorities in a much better position to fight against money laundering, corruption, and cross-border crime,” said Rihards Kols, Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Saeima, which initiated the draft law.

According to the annotation, the aim of the draft law “On Amendment No. 1 in the Agreement on Law Enforcement between the Government of the Republic of Latvia and the Government of the United States of America of September 2004” is to follow up on the USA initiative to continue the cooperation launched in 2001 and 2004, when intergovernmental agreements were concluded regarding cooperation in capacity building and upskilling of law enforcement personnel.

In the context of the aforementioned amendment to the Agreement, the USA Government is planning to allocate approximately 2 to 2.5 million USD for training of Latvian law enforcement personnel to be conducted by experts from the USA. The training is to be provided to judges, experts from investigative authorities and the Prosecutor’s Office, who are working on the prevention of corruption, money laundering, international financial and economic crimes.

Saeima Press Service