India plays active role in global operations coordinated by INTERPOL: head Jurgen Stock
Oct 17, 2022
New Delhi [India], October 17 : Ahead of the 90th General Assembly of INTERPOL tomorrow, Secretary General Jurgen Stock on Monday said India plays an extremely active role in a range of global operations coordinated by INTERPOL.
The 90th General Assembly of INTERPOL will be held from October 18 to 21. The meeting will be attended by delegations from 195 INTERPOL member countries comprising of Ministers, Police Chiefs of countries, Heads of National Central Bureaus and Senior police officers.
"I would like to start by saying how very pleased I am that we are here in New Delhi for our 90th General Assembly, especially as this coincides with India's celebrations of 75 years of independence," Jurgen Stock said during a press conference.
The four-day General Assembly is INTERPOL's supreme governing body and meets once a year to take key decisions related to its functioning. Over the coming days, Secretary General Stock said they will be addressing a range of global security issues and how these can be addressed through the unique platform which is INTERPOL.
"It was to gain a better view of the threats faced by law enforcement that we have produced the first INTERPOL Global Crime Trend Report, which will be present to our membership during this General Assembly," he said.
Giving details about the most significant trend in the world of organized crime, Stock said, "Organized crime networks are making billions of dollars, and the fact that less than one per cent of global illicit financial flows are intercepted and recovered - or rather, nearly 99 per cent of stolen assets remain in criminal hands - should be of greater concern to everyone."
He said that combined with estimates of the global cost of cybercrime which is expected to reach 10.5 trillion US dollars by 2025. "Police around the world are overwhelmed with data, and too often they do not have the capacity to deal with the volume of cases - and here INTERPOL is uniquely placed to provide the support they need."
"Today, with the click of a button, police anywhere in the world can instantly check against INTERPOL's 19 global databases containing 126 million records including DNA profiles and facial recognition images. Our databases are checked more than 20 million times each day - which equates to around 250 searches per second," he added.
On India's role in International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL), Stock said, "Indeed India plays extremely active role in a range of global operations coordinated by INTERPOL."
"For example in the recent Operation Lionfish targeting drug trafficking, when Indian authorities made the largest single seizure of heroin during the operation intercepting 75kg of the drug," he added.
