EU Projects

Projects funded by the European Union

IRZ carries out projects on legal and judicial reform, which are issued for tender by the European Union (EU) under various funding programmes.

Our work is based on five guidelines:

• IRZ assumes EU projects in its partner states and, as part of its strategic orientation, expands its remit to include individual countries from the Middle East and Africa.
• IRZ exploits synergies between bilateral activities and EU-funded projects in a partner state.
• IRZ does not engage in double consultancy.
• IRZ advises its partner institutions on an egalitarian basis.
• IRZ ensures an efficient use of resources to achieve optimum results for its partners.

The following financing instruments in particular apply to IRZ:

• IPA II (Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance): for potential EU accession candidates, notably in the Western Balkan states
• ENI (European Neighbourhood Instrument): to promote democracy and human rights in the Eastern Partnership region and the Mediterranean
• DCI (Development Cooperation Instrument): particularly relevant to Central Asia

EU twinning

The European Union has been supporting the development of public structures in accordance with European values and standards for approx. 25 years through partnerships between authorities in EU member states and partner countries (twinning). The projects adopt a partnership approach: the partner states are supported and advised along with employees from the respective authorities of the EU member states.

IRZ has represented the Federal Ministry of Justice in the application and implementation of EU twinning projects (“mandated body”) in the justice sector since 1998 during which time it has been involved in over 90 projects. We have also been able to successfully implement numerous projects in consortia with new EU member states in recent years, including Croatia and Latvia.

TAIEX

The Technical Assistance and Information Exchange Instrument (TAIEX) is used by the European Commission to implement short-term measures that, similar to the twinning projects, serve to promote a direct exchange between authorities. Employees of public administrations can exchange experiences on specific topics in workshops and study trips to the EU member states and during expert trips to the relevant countries. Requests are sent from the respective countries that are part of the EU programmes ENI and ENPI. The IRZ receives enquiries on themes relating to the justice sector from the National Contact Point for Twinning and TAIEX, the NCP (National Contact Point) in the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy.

EU grants

Similar to twinning, only a limited group of applicants are eligible for grants, which generally includes IRZ as a mandated institution of the Federal Ministry of Justice. This also generally requires the cooperation of several EU member states. IRZ considers that cooperation with both new partners such as Croatia and Latvia and long-established implementing organizations, e.g. France, Italy and the Netherlands, has been successful when forming the consortia.

EU technical assistance

IRZ is also continuing to be active within the framework of EU technical assistance projects. The corresponding calls for tender are aimed at a much larger group of applicants. IRZ is a popular cooperation partner as a highly specialized institution with many years of experience in implementing similar profit-oriented projects on the topic of judicial reform.