THE ROLE OF INTERPOL IN ENVIRONMENTAL ENFORCEMENT 

SØREN KLEM (transcript of a contribution to the Conference)

I.C.P.O. Interpol, General Secretariat, 50, Quay Achille Lignon, 69006, Lyon, France

 

My name is Søren Klem, I'm working in the I.C.P.O. Interpol General Secretariat in Lyon France, in the Economic Crime Group. Apart from a large number of different kinds of fraud I also deal with the field of environmental crime.

The illegal transboundary movements of hazardous wastes is of special interest to Interpol for many reasons:

First and foremost because the crime is international and this is, as you know, what Interpol is dealing with. Another reason is that traffic in hazardous waste is normally organized crime and associated with violations in other fields of law, such as fraud, breach of trust, bribery, document forgery etc. Furthermore, the criminals are very often experienced and previously known to the police for other offenses such as for instant trafficking in drugs and different kinds of frauds.

So far, only a few number of cases on environmental crime have been reported to the General Secretariat from the Interpol member countries. However, all of these cases are in fact dealing with traffic in hazardous waste and dangerous substances. Now, to get some more information and a more global picture about this specific kind crime, we recently sent out a questionnaire to all the 158 member countries and the result of this study was published last week.

It is obvious, that if this problem is to be dealt with effectively, the enforcement agencies in the involved countries will have to collect, process and exchange as much information as possible. In this connection Interpol can play an important role as the central point and platform for this information exchange and case coordination.

Let me briefly give some reasons for this:

  • Firstly, rapid and safe exchange of information through our independent and world-wide telecommunication network.

  • Secondly, a highly performing Criminal Information System.

  • Thirdly, legal and police and translation expertise and excellent meeting and conference facilities.

When we receive information on for instant traffic in hazardous waste we will immediately respond to the involved countries if elements in the message are known to the files of The General Secretariat and of course if this information is not already known to the countries. This response is sent out immediately and as a rule at least within 24 hours. Furthermore, If we see a pattern or a trend of criminality we will send out a diffusion to inform and warn the countries against f.g. a group of criminals or a special kind of MODUS OPERANDI. This message can be diffused all over the world within seconds.

We can also invite investigators for member countries to join together in working groups in the auspices of Interpol - either on a case to case basis or on a permanent basis. We already have a number of these working groups going on in other field of crime. Apart from the working groups our department hosts each year a conference on International fraud and the subject of environmental crime was in fact the main topic on the agenda on our latest conference in June this year.

Recognizing the seriousness of environmental crime, Interpol will in the future give priority to this subject and especially the hazardous waste traffic. It is our intention to include the subject of environmental crime in our future fraud conferences.

Finally, I think you should know that Interpol can in fact, through the national central bureaus, cooperate with any government agency concerned with combating criminal offenses, including environmental enforcement agencies.

So I hope that Interpol in the future will play an important role in the fight against international environmental crime and I am looking forward to cooperating with you in this respect.

Just promise me, that you will go through your local national Interpol bureau.

If you have any questions you are welcome to contact me at any time during this conference.