Police chiefs disagree on extradition
Police chiefs disagree on extradition
JAKARTA (JP): ASEAN police chiefs ended their three-day conference Wednesday agreeing to boost cooperation efforts, despite shooting down Indonesia's proposal on a regional extradition treaty.
The 15th annual ASEAN Police (ASEANAPOL) conference was closed by Indonesia Police Chief Gen. Banurusman Astrosemitro.
"We are determined to enhance cooperation in handling trans- national crime in ASEAN member countries," Banurusman said.
The police chiefs issued a 10-point joint communique in which they agreed to step up cooperation in combating drug trafficking, fraudulent travel documents, commercial crime, phantomship frauds and product counterfeiting.
They also agreed on exchanges of personnel, training programs, mutual assistance in criminal matters and the establishment of a temporary ASEANAPOL secretariat and data base.
The communique, however, made no mention of an extradition treaty, which was one of the hottest issues during last year's ASEANAPOL conference in Phuket, Thailand.
When opening the meeting, Indonesian Armed Forces Commander Gen. Feisal Tanjung proposed that each member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations adopt extradition pacts to help curb the increasing frequency of trans-national crime.
ASEAN groups Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines, Thailand and Singapore. Vietnam, who will join ASEAN this year, is an observer at the conference.
Delegates from Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines were keen to push each member country to have not only a bilateral but also a regional extradition treaty.
In the region, Indonesia has extradition agreements with Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines.
Malaysian police chief Tan Sri Rahim Noor and Filipino Recaredo A. Sarmiento said that an extradition treaty would facilitate the exchange of criminals.
But Singapore's police commissioner Tee Tua Ba said that the ASEAN countries can exchange criminals and fugitives based on each member's "mutual assistance treaty".
A member country can hand over a criminal without having an extradition agreement, he said.
He added that the conference could not decide on extradition without the involvement of other agencies such as individual ministries of justice and foreign affairs.
The police chiefs also agreed that drug trafficking is a serious threat in the region and agreed to step up cooperation to combat it.
With regard to the rising incidence of fraudulent travel documents, the conference agreed to make recommendations to relevant government officials to improve security measures, including the use of finger printing.
The communique also underlined the importance of mutual assistance to reduce crime in the ASEAN countries.
Because investigations into trans-national criminal cases are often hindered by each country's different laws, the conference agreed to work on a common legal foundation for future incidents.
On economic crime, the use of advanced technologies has allowed more and more sophisticated crimes to occur in the banking system, especially in the forgery of credit cards.
As a result, each country agreed on the need to step up the exchange of information to determine criminals' identities and their techniques.
To facilitate the exchange of information, the police chief agreed to establish a data base. The tender will be held in Singapore this year.
The police chiefs, however, agreed that it was not necessary to establish a permanent secretariat to be in charge of formulating the agenda of the upcoming conference, which will be held in Kuala Lumpur. (pan)