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13 JULY 2012. - An Act to approve the Convention between the Government of the Kingdom of Belgium and the Government of the Republic of Croatia on police cooperation, signed in Zagreb on 19 October 2004 (1) (2)

ALBERT II, King of the Belgians,
To all, present and to come, Hi.
The Chambers adopted and We sanction the following:
Article 1^er. This Act regulates a matter referred to in Article 77 of the Constitution.
Art. 2. The Convention between the Government of the Kingdom of Belgium and the Government of the Republic of Croatia on police cooperation, signed in Zagreb on 19 October 2004, will take effect.
Promulgation of this law, let us order that it be clothed with the seal of the State and published by the Belgian Monitor.
Given in Brussels, 13 July 2012
ALBERT
By the King:
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs,
D. REYNDERS
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior,
Ms. J. MILQUET
The Minister of Justice,
Ms. A. TURTELBOOM
Seal of the state seal:
The Minister of Justice,
Ms. A. TURTELBOOM
____
Notes
(1) Session 2011-2012.
Senate.
Documents.
Bill tabled on 28/03/2012, No. 5-1552/1.
Report on behalf of Commission No. 5-1552/2.
Annales parliamentarians.
Discussion, meeting of May 31, 2012.
Vote, meeting of 31 May 2012.
Room.
Documents.
Project transmitted by the Senate, No. 53-2228/1.
Report made on behalf of Commission No. 53-2228/2.
Text adopted in plenary and submitted to Royal Assent No. 53-2228/3.
Annales parliamentarians.
Discussion, meeting of June 14, 2012.
Vote, meeting of 14 June 2012.
(2) The Convention comes into force on 1^er December 2013.

Convention between the Government of the Kingdom of Belgium
and the Government of the Republic of Croatia
on police cooperation
THE GOVERNMENT OF THE BELGIUM ROYAUME
AND
THE GOVERNMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF CROATIA
the Contracting Parties,
Based on:
SOUCI to promote relations of friendship and cooperation between the two States, and in particular on the common desire to strengthen police cooperation among them;
LE DESIR to strengthen this police cooperation within the framework of the international commitments undertaken by the two States in respect of fundamental rights and freedoms, including the European Convention on Human Rights and the Council of Europe Convention for the Protection of Persons with regard to the automated processing of personal data of 28 January 1981;
CONSIDERING that the fight against terrorism-related crime within the meaning of the 1977 European Convention for the Suppression of Terrorism is a necessity for the defence of democratic values and institutions;
CONSIDERING that international organized crime poses a serious threat to the socio-economic development of the Contracting Parties, and that recent developments in international organized crime endanger their institutional functioning;
CONSIDERING that the fight against trafficking in human beings and the suppression of illegal entry and exits of the territory of the Contracting Parties and illegal migration, as well as the elimination of organized channels participating in these illegal acts, are a concern of the Governments and parliaments of the Contracting Parties;
CONSIDERING that the illegal production and trade of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances constitute a danger to the health and safety of citizens;
CONSIDERANT THAT the only harmonization of legislation is not enough to combat the phenomenon of clandestine migration with sufficient efficiency;
CONSIDERING that the need for effective international police cooperation in the field of organized crime and illegal migration, including through the exchange and processing of information, is essential to combat and prevent such criminal activities;
CONSIDERING that the fulfilment of this requirement requires a series of appropriate measures and close cooperation between the Contracting Parties;
ONT RESOLU DE CONCLIDE LA PRESENTE CONVENTION :
Definitions
Article 1^er
For the purposes of this Convention, the following means:
International trafficking in human beings, any following intentional behaviour:
(a) facilitate the entry into the territory of the State party to this Convention, the transit, the stay or the exit in that territory if it is used, for that purpose, of the constraint, including violence or threats or, if there is recourse to deception, abuse of authority or other forms of pressure in such a way that the person has no other genuine and acceptable choices than to submit to them;
(b) to exploit in any way an informed person that such person has entered, transited or resided in the territory of the State party to this Convention under the conditions specified in (a).
Sexual exploitation of children
The offences referred to in Article 34 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child of 20 November 1989, including the production, sale, distribution or other forms of trafficking in pornographic material involving children and the detention for personal purposes of such material.
Technical assistance
By technical assistance, the logistical support provided to police and migration services must be understood.
Nuclear and radioactive material crime
Offences as listed in Article 7, § 1 of the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material, signed in Vienna and New York on 3 March 1980.
Money laundering
Offences as listed in Article 6 paragraphs 1 to 3 of the Council of Europe Convention relating to the laundering, detection, seizure and confiscation of proceeds of crime, signed in Strasbourg on 8 November 1990.
Organized crime
Any offence committed by a "criminal organization", defined as a structured association, of more than two persons, established in time, and acting in a concerted manner with a view to committing offences punishable by deprivation of liberty or a measure of deprivation of liberty for a maximum of four years or a more serious penalty, these offences are an end in itself or a means to obtain property benefits, and if so,
Processing of personal data
By personal data, any information concerning an identified or identifiable natural person must be heard (the data subject); is deemed to be identifiable a person who may be identified, directly or indirectly, including by reference to an identification number or to one or more specific elements, specific to his or her physical, physiological, psychic, economic, cultural or social identity.
By processing personal data, it is necessary to hear any operation or set of operations carried out or not using automated processes, and applied to personal data, such as the collection, recording, organization, preservation, adaptation or modification, extraction, consultation, use, communication by transmission, diffusion or any other form of disposal, removal or interconnection,
Narcotics
The term "stupid" means any substance, whether natural or synthetic, contained in Table I or Table II of the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, made in New York on 30 March 1961. Any subsequent Convention that will expand the list of narcotic drugs will be implemented.
Psychotropic substance
The term "psytropic substance" means any substance, whether natural or synthetic, or any natural product in Table I, II, III or IV of the Convention on Psychotropic Substances of 21 February 1971. Any subsequent Convention that will expand the list of narcotic drugs will be implemented.
Illicit trafficking in narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances
The term "illegal traffic" refers to the cultivation, manufacture or trafficking of narcotics or psychotropic substances contrary to the purposes of the Convention of 30 March 1961 on Narcotic Drugs, the Convention of 21 February 1971 on Psychotropic Substances or the United Nations Convention of 19 December 1988 on the Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances.
Urgent request
An application is deemed to be a urgent in cases where the passage through formal administrative procedure to the central authorities may interfere or jeopardize prevention or research.
Areas of cooperation
Article 2
1. Each Contracting Party undertakes to grant to the other Party, under the rules and conditions set out in this Convention, the broadest cooperation with regard to police cooperation.
2. They will cooperate in the repression, prevention and prosecution of serious crimes of organized crime, in particular:
- offences against the life and physical integrity of persons;
- offences related to the production and illegal trafficking of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances and precursors;
- offences related to the production, trade, prescription and administration of hormone, anti-hormonal, beta-adrenergic or production stimulator effects, exploitation animals, as well as offences related to the trade in the animals of exploitation and meat of these exploitation animals to which these substances are administered and finally offences related to the treatment of such meat;
- trafficking in human beings including illegal migration and trafficking in human beings;
- sexual exploitation of children and child pornography;
- procuring;
- criminal activities related to terrorism;
- extortion of funds;
- theft, trafficking and illegal trade of weapons, ammunition, explosives, radioactive substances, nuclear materials and other dangerous substances;
- falsifications (fabrication, counterfeiting, processing and distribution) of means of payment, cheques and securities;
- crime in the field of economic and financial activities;- offences against property, including theft, trafficking in works of art and historical objects;
- theft, illegal trade and traffic of motor vehicles and the falsification and use of falsified vehicle documents;
- money laundering.
3. The forms of serious organized crime that are not defined in Article 1 are appreciated by the competent national authorities according to the national legislation of the States to which they belong.
Article 3
Collaboration between Contracting Parties will also include:
- searching for missing persons, and helping to identify unidentified bodies;
- the search on the territory of a Contracting Party of stolen, disappeared, diverted or misplaced objects in the territory of the other.
Article 4
The Contracting Parties shall cooperate in the areas specified in Articles 2 and 3 above by:
- exchange of information on areas within the jurisdiction of police and immigration services;
- exchange of equipment;
- technical and scientific assistance, expertise and supplies of specialized technical equipment;
- an exchange of experience and specialized personnel in the areas covered by this Convention;
- cooperation in the field of vocational training;
- assistance in the preparation of requests for mutual legal assistance, including specific research methods and some other investigative methods;
- the implementation of measures taken on the basis of witness protection programmes;
in accordance with the following provisions.
The exchange of information
Article 5
The Contracting Parties will provide assistance and close and ongoing cooperation. They will, inter alia, exchange all relevant and important information.
This cooperation may take the form of permanent contact through liaison officers to be designated.
Article 6
1. The Contracting Parties undertake to ensure that their police services, in accordance with national law and within the limits of their competence, provide assistance for the prevention and search for punishable acts, provided that the national law of the requested Contracting Party does not reserve the request or its execution to the judicial authorities.
2. In particular cases, each Contracting Party may, in accordance with its national law and without being invited to do so, communicate to the Contracting Party concerned information that may be important to the Contracting Party concerned for the purpose of assisting in the prevention and suppression of offences or for the prevention of threats to public order and security.
Article 7
Any information provided by the Contracting Party required under this Convention shall not be used by the requesting Contracting Party for the purpose of providing evidence of the facts incriminated only after a request for mutual legal assistance in accordance with the applicable international provisions.
Article 8
1. Requests for assistance and responses to these requests must be exchanged between the central bodies responsible, by each Contracting Party, for international police cooperation and immigration.
When the request cannot be made in a timely manner by the above-mentioned channel, it may, exceptionally and in an emergency only, be addressed by the competent authorities of the requesting Contracting Party directly to the competent authorities of the requested Party and they may respond directly to it. In these exceptional cases, the requesting authority must notify, as soon as possible, the central body responsible, in the required Contracting Party, of its direct request and to motivate its urgency.
2. The Contracting Parties shall notify the list of the central bodies responsible for international cooperation by diplomatic means.
Article 9
The requesting competent authority shall guarantee the degree of confidentiality that the required competent authority of the other Party has assigned to the information. The safety levels are those used by EUROPOL.
Article 10
1. Contracting Parties may detach, for a specified or indeterminate duration, liaison officers from a Contracting Party to the other Contracting Party.
2. The purpose of the detachment of liaison officers for a specified or indeterminate period is to promote and accelerate cooperation between Contracting Parties, including by agreeing to:
(a) in the form of an exchange of information for the purposes of both preventive and repressive fight against crime;
(b) in the execution of requests for mutual legal assistance in criminal matters;
(c) for the purpose of carrying out missions of the authorities responsible for the monitoring of external borders and immigration;
(d) for the purpose of carrying out the missions of the authorities responsible for the prevention of threats to public order.
3. Liaison officers have an advisory and assistance mission. They are not competent for the autonomous execution of police measures. They provide information and carry out their missions in accordance with the instructions given to them by the Contracting Party of origin and by the Contracting Party to which they are detached. They regularly report to the central police cooperation body of the Contracting Party to which they are detached.
4. The competent ministers of the Contracting Parties may agree that liaison officials of a Contracting Party seconded to third States shall also represent the interests of the other Contracting Party.
Protection of personal data
Article 11
1. The competent authorities of the Contracting Parties, in accordance with their national legislation, undertake to achieve a level of protection of personal data that complies with the provisions of the Council of Europe Convention of 28 January 1981 for the protection of persons with regard to the automated processing of personal data and Recommendation R (87) 15 of 17 September 1987 of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe to regulate the use of personal data in the private sector.
2. With regard to the processing of personal data transmitted under this Convention, the following provisions apply:
(a) data may only be used by the recipient Contracting Party for the purposes for which this Convention provides for the processing of such data and under the conditions determined by the Contracting Party providing them; the use of data for other purposes is only possible after the prior authorization of the Contracting Party which transmits the data and in accordance with the legislation of the Contracting Party to which it is intended;
(b) data may be used only by the judicial and police authorities, the services and bodies that perform a task or perform a function for the purposes referred to in this Convention and in particular articles 2 and 3. Contracting Parties will provide the list of users; the communication of data to other bodies that pursue the same objectives as those services and authorities and that act in that same framework may only be carried out after prior authorization from the Contracting Party providing them;
(c) the Contracting Party that transmits the data shall ensure the accuracy and completeness of the data; each Contracting Party shall ensure that the personal data transmitted is not retained longer than necessary. If it finds either on its own initiative or in response to a request from the data subject, that incorrect data or that should not have been transmitted have been provided, the recipient Contracting Party(s) must be informed without delay; the latter or the latter are required to correct or destroy the data, or to mention that the data is incorrect or should not have been transmitted;
(d) a Contracting Party may not invoke the fact that another Contracting Party has transmitted incorrect data to discharge its responsibility under its national law with respect to an injured person;
(e) the transmission and receipt of personal data shall be recorded. Contracting Parties shall communicate the list of authorities or services authorized to consult the registration;
(f) access to data is governed by the national law of the Contracting Party to which the data subject submits its application. The communication of the data to the applicant is only possible after requesting permission from the Contracting Party that is the source of the data;
(g) upon request, the recipient Contracting Party shall inform the Contracting Party which shall transmit the data of its use and the results obtained on the basis of the data transmitted.
3. Each Contracting Party shall designate a supervisory authority, in accordance with national law, to exercise independent control over the processing of personal data carried out on the basis of this Convention and to verify whether such treatments are not infringinging on the rights of the person concerned. These supervisory authorities are also competent to analyse the difficulties in the application or interpretation of this Convention relating to the processing of personal data. Such supervisory authorities may agree to cooperate in the missions recognized by this Convention.
Article 12
If personal data are transmitted through a liaison officer referred to in section 10, the provisions of this title shall apply only when the liaison officer transmits this data to the Contracting Party to which it has been detached.
Exception
Article 13
Each Party shall refuse assistance when it comes to political or military offences or where such assistance is contrary to the legal provisions in force in its territory.
Each of the Parties may refuse assistance or subject it to conditions when it comes to related offences to political or military offences or where the realization of assistance could threaten the sovereignty, security, public order or other essential interests of the State.
Other forms of cooperation
Article 14
1. The Contracting Parties agree to provide mutual assistance in the field of vocational training and technical assistance for problems related to the operation of the police.
2. Parties agree to share their practical experiences in all areas covered by this Convention.
3. The modalities of mutual assistance are regulated by arrangements between the competent ministers of the Contracting Parties.
Concertation
Article 15
1. The competent ministers of the Contracting Parties may establish permanent or occasional working groups to examine common problems concerning the suppression and prevention of the areas of crime referred to in Article 2 and the areas of cooperation referred to in Article 3 and to develop, where appropriate, proposals to improve, where appropriate, the practical and technical aspects of cooperation between the Contracting Parties.
2. The costs associated with the implementation of cooperation shall be borne by each Party, unless otherwise provided by the representatives of the Parties, duly authorized.
3. The competent ministers of the Contracting Parties may establish an assessment group that will report on the implementation of this Convention to the competent ministers of the Contracting Parties.
Settlement of disputes
Article 16
Any dispute arising from the interpretation or application of this Convention shall be resolved by a joint consultative commission.
There shall be established a joint consultative commission, composed of representatives of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Interior and Justice, which shall meet periodically at the request of either State, in order to facilitate the resolution of problems arising from the interpretation or application of this Convention.
Final provisions
Article 17
Monitoring of the implementation of this Agreement shall be carried out in accordance with the national law of each Contracting Party.
Article 18
The Contracting Parties shall, in writing and through diplomatic channels, notify each other of the fulfilment of the formalities required by their national legislation for its entry into force.
This Convention shall enter into force on the first day of the second month following the date of receipt of the last notification provided for in paragraph 1 of this article, provided that the Republic of Croatia has, in the meantime, become a party to the Convention for the Protection of Persons with regard to the automatic processing of personal data. Otherwise, the entry into force will take place on the date the Republic of Croatia becomes a party to this Convention.
This Convention shall be concluded for an unlimited period of time. Any Party may denounce it by means of a written notification sent by diplomatic visits to the other Party. The denunciation shall take effect 6 months after the date of receipt of the notification relating to the denunciation.
Article 19
Any Party may send to the other Party any proposals to amend this Convention. The Parties shall agree in writing on the amendments to this Convention.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, the undersigned, duly authorized by their respective Governments, have affixed their signatures to the bottom of this Convention.
DONE in Zagreb on 19 October 2004, in two original copies, in each of the French, Dutch, Croatian and English languages, the four texts being equally authentic.