Latest blog articles

The approach of drugs related problems in Maastricht, with the help of a specially equipped project Frontière, based on the decrease of visible nuisance in the city over the recent years, has so far been successful. ^{(This blog is only available in Dutch)} 

The statutory pension of civil cervants in Belgium is on de verge of a reform. The legislative proposal ‘mixed pension’ will soon be introduced by law, after being the centre of intense debate for nearly a year. What exactly does ‘mixed pension’ mean?

On the 4^th of April 2018 - in Strasbourg the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe adopted a groundbreaking recommendation concerning children of imprisoned parents.

The well-known British James Bulger case is ‘celebrating’ its 25^th anniversary. This revives the debate on how we should deal with children suspected and convicted of serious crimes.

On 21 December the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) held its official closing ceremony. The Tribunal is thereby a thing of the past. But it lives on in the countries of the former Yugoslavia, first and foremost in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), but also in Serbia and...

It would have been rather uncomfortable for the Court to rule that the Italian limitation periods for serious VAT-fraud cases should be set aside, wouldn't it? Can Taricco II be, after all, just a temporary (and unstable!) bridge over the troubled waters of the EU’s financial interests, soon to be...

Instead of protecting the victims of Burundi, the current government shields those who are responsible. The problem with such impunity is that it de facto “legalizes” violence as no accountability is created.

While there are no indications that the number of serious violations of integrity in law enforcement has increased over the past five years, the violations are getting more serious. Investigating authorities such as the Dutch National Police Internal Investigations Department are faced with more...

Last week, the Dutch and Belgian ombudsmen called on their governments to take action in the context of pensions problems for unemployed cross-border workers, aged 65, and living in Belgium. In response to this call, a possible solution by Expertise Centre ITEM is elaborated in this blog.

This blog...

Where in 2010, about 40 per cent of the population downloaded music, the figure is now a quarter, partly because of the arrival of Spotify. The best strategy to avoid illegal downloading, according to Bastiaan Leeuw, is a mixture of punishment and temptation.