Europol
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 The headquarters of Europol in The Hague, the Netherlands |
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| Agency overview | |
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| Formed | 1 October 1998 |
| Jurisdiction | European Union |
| Headquarters | The Hague, Netherlands |
| Employees | 940 (December 2015) |
| Annual budget | € 100.2 million (2016) |
| Agency executive |
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| Key document | |
| Website | europol |
The European Police Office (commonly abbreviated Europol) is the law enforcement agency of the European Union (EU) that handles criminal intelligence and combating serious international organised crime by means of cooperation between the relevant authorities of the member states, including those tasked with customs, immigration services, border and financial police etc. Headquartered in The Hague, the agency has 912 staff, of which there are regular police officers and 185 liaison officers as well as personnel seconded from national law enforcement organisations.
The agency has no executive powers, and its officials are not entitled to conduct investigations in the member states or to arrest suspects. Europol, in providing support through information exchange, intelligence analysis, expertise, and training, can contribute to the executive measures carried out by the relevant national authorities.
Europol has its origins in TREVI, a forum for internal security cooperation amongst EEC/EC interior and justice ministers created in 1975 and active until the Maastricht Treaty came into effect in 1993.
Germany, with its federal organisation of police forces, had long been in favour of a supranational police organisation at EC level. It tabled a surprise proposal to establish a European Police Office to the European Council meeting in Luxembourg in June 1991. By that December, the Intergovernmental Conference was coming to an end and the member states had pledged themselves to establishing Europol through Article K.1(9) of the Maastricht Treaty. Europol was given the modest role of establishing ‘a Union-wide system for exchanging information’ amongst EU police forces.
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