German police officer Stefan Feller, who was the Mission's commissioner, said he was convinced that since 2003, when the Mission was set up, great progress had been made in establishing the rule of law in BiH which led the country towards EU membership.
The responsibility for the continued improvement of the overall situation and the adoption of police standards necessary on BiH's EU path is in the hands of the Bosnian authorities, Feller told reporters.
Over the past nine years, the unarmed EU police supervised the operations and conduct of the members of BiH's 13 police agencies.
Unlike the UN's previous International Police Force, which was set up after the signing of the Dayton peace agreement in 1995, the EUPM was not authorised to take an active part in investigations by BiH's police agencies.
BiH has a complex and decentralised system of police agencies operating on the level of the state, the two entities, and the ten cantons in the Federation entity.
Feller said that such a structure, in whose establishment the EUPM took part in an advisory capacity, was the result of compromise which, nonetheless, ensured the establishment of standards required for BiH's EU integration.