[Completed] Security cooperation with Panama (SECOPA)
The action provided strategic support to Panama's recent efforts to create a solid and permanent institutional framework for citizen security. It also focused on creating a system for the ongoing monitoring and evaluation of the recently approved National Citizen Security Strategy (ENSC), as well as promoting greater effectiveness and accountability in its implementation. Within the framework of the ENSC, innovative actions in the areas of prevention, control and rehabilitation were increased and improved. Based on the EU concept of security sector reform, the project implemented a balanced and human rights-based approach. Support for national efforts to reform the security sector in Panama was also achieved through the consolidation of the prosecution service and the improvement of the prison system in line with human rights and international standards. These actions strengthened primary violence prevention, targeting young people in at-risk areas, both in and out of school, in municipalities with the highest crime rates, and supported rehabilitation and resocialisation programmes for young people detained in juvenile detention centres and in custody centres for minors in conflict with the law
Duration: December 2013 - June 2023 (10 years)
Total amount contributed by the EU: €28,000,000
Component 1: implemented by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), with a budget of €6 million
Component 2: administered by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and implemented by the Ministry of Security through the Office of Comprehensive Security (OSEGUI), with funding of €22 million:
- Support for the creation of a high-level administrative and institutional coordination structure for the promotion of the National Citizen Security Strategy
- Implementation of primary (general public) and tertiary (juveniles in conflict with the law) prevention methods to combat violence, drug addiction and social exclusion, including the construction of a Juvenile Detention Centre in Pacora
- Strengthening of the National Police service in community policing (new community police station in Samaria)
- Support for the creation of three comprehensive care centres for women victims of violence (INAMU) in Colón, Panama City and San Miguelito.
Financing Instrument: Development Cooperation Instrument (DCI)
Beneficiary area: Panama
