On 5-6 December 2012, the Department of Legal Studies of the University of Salento, in partnership with the Center for the Study of Democracy (Sofia, Bulgaria) and Droit au Droit, (DAD), organised the final module of the judicial training on EU crimes against environment and maritime pollution, which was held in Lecce, Italy.

The purpose of the training session was to train legal professionals on the EU legislation and jurisprudence on environmental crimes in order to strengthen their knowledge and competence in the sector as well as their capacity to contribute to their effective enforcement. The session was dedicated to the analysis of relevant case law on maritime pollution crimes, with a specific focus on the Prestige and Erika cases. International experts which contributed to the session included Joan Baucells Lladòs, Professor of penal law, University of Barcelona, Benoit Petit, Professor of Law, University of Versailles, Paris, Ennio Cillo, Public Prosecutor, Head Coordinator of environmental crimes in the areas of Lecce, Brindisi and Taranto, and Melita Carevic, Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb.

The training course was organised in the framework of a project supported by the European Commission, aimed at building the capacity of judges, prosecutors, forensic officers and other legal practitioners (from selected EU Member States as well as countries on the road to EU membership, geographically located along the coast of the Adriatic sea (namely Italy, Bulgaria, Albania, Montenegro, Croatia) to implement existing European and international instruments and rules aimed at tackling environmental crimes and in particular marine pollution.

For more information and recent updates on the project please visit: http://www.judt.unisalento.it/.

*Project "Judicial training and research on EU crimes against environment and maritime pollution - TRAINENV" (JUST/2010/JPEN/AG/1540). Project leader: USAL (IT)