12/11/2024 (Agence Europe) – Austrian Michael Schmid has been elected by his peers to head the EU’s European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation (Eurojust) for a four-year term from Friday 15 November, replacing Ladislav Hamran, who is coming to the end of his second term. Mr Schmid, who has been the Austrian judicial authorities’ representative at Eurojust since 2022, previously held the position of Justice Counsellor at the Permanent Representation of Austria to the EU. “My goal is to strengthen Eurojust’s support for the judicial authorities across Europe. In recent years, criminal proceedings have grown increasingly complex, driven by the rise of digitalisation, increasing links to non-European countries, and a more interconnected web of criminal networks. It is only together that we will be able to effectively tackle these challenges”, he declared, according to a press release. (MB)