4.5 Mission to Serbia From 8 to 12 May, the Mission and the MoI’s Criminal Investigations Directorate organized four one-day awarenessraising seminars on the use of virtual money, for police officers and prosecutors in Belgrade, Novi Sad, Kragujevac and Nis. The seminars illustrated how cybercriminals use legitimate financial resources, such as Bitcoins, to commit crimes, launder money and sell narcotics using overlay networks (darknet). 80 police investigators and 40 prosecutors participated in the seminars. This activity is part of the Mission’s assistance to police and prosecutors to enhance their capacities in investigating and prosecuting economic crimes and corruption committed in cyberspace. From 27 to 29 September, the Mission participated in the annual Europol-INTERPOL Cybercrime Conference held at Europol’s Headquarters, in The Hague, The Netherlands. The event gathered over 360 participants from 180 organizations, including law enforcement agencies, international organizations, academia and private industry, intended to strengthen co-operation in preventing and combating cybercrime. Other From March to December, the Mission, together with its implementing partner the Belgrade Centre for Security Policy (BCSP) implemented the project “Support to civil society networks to monitor security sector reform”, through which the Mission supported the BCSP efforts to co-ordinate 14 civil society organizations within the relevant civil society network mechanism. The Mission supported the civil society network’s efforts to contribute to and monitor ongoing reforms in security sector that inter alia include issues such as police reform, migration, fight against corruption and organized crime. This activity is a part of the Mission’s overall efforts to strengthen partnership between the police, government actors and civil society in addressing safety concerns. 88 From 14 to 16 March, the Mission supported a group of academics, civil society researchers and journalists from Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Albania in attending an international seminar on “Mafia and Anti-Mafia In Europe”, in Milan, Italy. Organized by the Italian Monitoring Center on Organized Crime (CROSS) of the University of Milan, the event aimed to foster dialogue on mafia-related issues and on creating a network of international scientific and local communities that share information, inputs and research on this topic. Throughout 2017, the Mission facilitated development of a network of academic organized crime researchers who are expected to produce a comparative research paper on the organized trafficking of narcotics, and the related state response, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Italy. These activities are a part of the Mission’s overall efforts to promote research on organized crime in Serbia and other SEE countries that would enhance the regional capacities for combating transnational, organized and serious crime. From 17 to 18 May, the Mission supported the participation of the Victimology Society of Serbia in the international annual Victim Support Europe Conference in Dublin, Ireland. This conference gathered some 400 participants working with victims of crime, such as victim support organizations, civil society organizations, psychologists, academics, government officials, police, prosecutors, judges and lawyers. The representatives of the Victimology Society of Serbia presented Serbian achievements in developing the national system of victim support services. This activity is part of the Mission’s efforts to assist in development of support to vulnerable victims of crime.