Eurojust written requests (or recommendations) are issued by National Members to assist national authorities when jurisdictional issues arise between two or more Member States. They are based on Article 4(2)(b) of the Eurojust Regulation and fall within the autonomous initiative powers of Eurojust. They usually take the form of ‘joint requests’, i.e. requests issued jointly by two or more National Members involved in a case (and, sometimes, by Liaison Prosecutors). With a joint request, the National Members ask their respective competent authorities to accept that one of them is in a better position to undertake an investigation or prosecute specific acts. The conclusion included in the joint request is based on an in-depth assessment of the legal and factual circumstances of the case and is developed in accordance with the Eurojust Guidelines for deciding ‘which jurisdiction should prosecute?’.

This report first presents what a Eurojust written recommendation on jurisdiction is, in light of the relevant legal framework and the practice developed so far (Section 2). After a description of the scope of the project and the methodology followed (Section 3), and some statistics (Section 4.1), the report provides an overview of the main results of the analysis in relation to the national authorities’ compliance with the Eurojust written recommendations (Section 4.2), the challenges brought at national level against the decision on jurisdiction (Section 4.3) and the role played by Eurojust after the issuing of the written recommendation (Section 4.4). The report concludes with some considerations on the effectiveness of this tool in light of the analysis carried out (Section 5).