Criminal Records. Ministry of Justice is unaware of the infringement process against Portugal
The Directorate-General for the Administration of Justice (DGAJ) still does not contain any notification about the infringement process of the European Commission (EC) against Portugal on the exchange of criminal records, said this Tuesday an official source at the Ministry of Justice.
In a written response sent to Lusa, the office of minister Francisca Van Dunem, who has accumulated this folder with the Internal Administration since Friday, explained that the DGAJ “has not yet been notified of any infringement procedure within the scope of the application of the rules on the exchange of criminal records “between member states of the European Union (EU),” whereby the facts imputed to Portugal are unknown”.
The process, which in addition to Portugal also targets Bulgaria, Cyprus, Greece and Malta, is based on problems related to electronic interconnection and the effective exchange of information on criminal records through the European Criminal Records Information System (ECRIS, in the English acronym), as well as in the notification of all new convictions and updates on the convictions to the Member State of nationality of the offender.
The Ministry of Justice acknowledged the existence of “some difficulties in setting up criminal records links between Portugal and other member states” following the start of work to link the Portuguese criminal record system to ECRIS in 2016. However, the office The minister estimates that these difficulties will be overcome “by the end of this year” and that the connection to ECRIS “should be fully functional”.
Asked about the concern expressed by Brussels that Portugal did not respond to requests for information on convictions within the deadlines, or even did not provide any response, the Ministry of Justice stressed that the DGAJ “responded to all requests within the deadlines set for it. ”
According to the community executive, Portugal has two months to notify Brussels about the correct application of the rules, under penalty of this advancing to a second phase of the infringement process.
ECRIS was created in 2012 and the framework decision for information exchange dates back to 2009.