Drug trafficking and other transnational crimes will received increased attention, Guyana’s forensic capability addressed and ensuring safe and secure prisons boosted under an agreement signed yesterday with the US Government, which provides a further US$50,000 to tackle these issues.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Carl Greenidge and Chargé d’Affaires of the Embassy of the United States of America Bryan Hunt yesterday signed a new letter of agreement under the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI), making the sum available to government to aid in the work of local law enforcement agencies.
Speaking to reporters during the signing ceremony held at the Takuba Lodge Greenidge said that this sum will fund a number of projects which not only targets narcotics trafficking and other illicit activities but also the prison system, judicial reform and the country’s forensic capability.
He reiterated said that the US government has committed US$45 million for the CBSI towards reducing crimes including illicit trafficking, advancing public safety and security and promoting social justice.
The two governments had signed the CBSI letter of agreement on narcotics control and law enforcement on April 8, April 2011, he said, adding that to date three letters of amendment had been signed. This newest letter of amendment, he explained will ensure the continuation of support to Guyana and will provide an additional US$50, 000, making the total funds provided to date US$900,000.
Greenidge said the funds will specifically be used for training, to provide equipment, to support criminal intelligence units and other relevant entities. “These actions we hope will improve the ability of law enforcement officials to gather information on drug trafficking organizations, to conduct investigations and to interdict illicit trafficking cross the country. He said that in this context there is the intention that in the long term the project will help to “enhance the quality and the integrity of the personnel assigned to CANU and to strengthen the partnership between CANU and drug enforcement administration as it regards investigative work, making it a more effective investigative partnership.”
The newest sum that has been committed he said will be used to fund three projects: law enforcement professionalization and support, strengthening counter narcotics control capabilities, and the rule of law and anti-corruption.
With regard to law enforcement professionalization and support, he explained that this project is designed to enhance the Guyana Police Force and the CANU’s capability to conduct counter narcotics operations at ports of entry by providing equipment and training as well as technical assistance. He said the training centres on areas of immigration procedures, detection of fraudulent documents, the identification and handling of suspicious persons among other areas targeting the illegal smuggling of aliens, narcotics and other illegal goods across the borders through ports and the airports.
The counter narcotics control capabilities element, he said, is supposed to enhance the country’s capability to conduct these operations country wide primarily through inter-agency coordination, gathering actionable evidence on drug trafficking as well as increased interdictions, seizures and eradication operations.
According to Greenidge, the rule of law and anti-corruption aspect encapsulates prisons, justice reform and forensics.
Training
He explained that the prison element seeks to expand the country’s capability regarding these correctional facilities to ensure they are safe, secure, fair and humane and that they conform to internationally accepted standards and norms. It will enhance the skills, knowledge and abilities of correctional officials to “appropriately and effectively manage a sustainable multi gender, multi custody offender population so that the correctional system contributes to public security, positively impacts on efforts to combat transnational crime and to provide prisoners with opportunities to reform and to be rehabilitated.” The funds, he said, will provide training and monitoring of corrections officials, offering exposure to different correctional methodologies.
The justice reform element, he said, deals with strengthening the judicial sector’s ability to address narcotics and transnational crimes while providing training in areas such as judicial administration, case management, case filing systems, anti-corruption as well as transparency and accountability of judicial sector institutions. Additionally, he said, there may also be projects to support training in investigations and prosecution of complex financial crimes, money laundering and asset forfeiture.
The forensic element, he said, is supposed to assist in building government’s capacity to collect, analyze and present in criminal proceedings the forensic element to enhance prosecution. “Forensic activities will include targeted technical assistance, training and equipment for crime scene investigation and evidence collection and the forensic project will also enhance the function of the forensic lab and work with the judicial system to utilize forensic evidence appropriately,” Greenidge said.
Meanwhile, Hunt noted that the prevention of criminality is a critical aspect of an effective law enforcement support and it is in this regard that the US government is committed to providing more funding to Guyana.
He made the point that the David Granger administration has been clear in “its political commitment to taking the steps necessary to ensure that Guyanese law enforcement agencies are able to prevent this country from being used as a safe haven by international criminal elements.” He alluded to government’s early passage of the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (Amendment) Bill, its financial commitment to the Serious Organized Crime Unit, and its initial steps towards reform of the police force. All of these, Hunt said, were tangible evidence, of government’s commitment to ensuring that law enforcement agencies are able to keep out international criminals.
“It is for this reason that my government has decided to invest further in our collective law enforcement partnership, and I look forward to strengthening our cooperative relationship with Guyana’s law enforcement agencies,” he told reporters.
Hunt noted that the financial resources being provided by US will play a critical role in training and equipping law enforcement agencies to enable them to expand their cooperative efforts to combat narcotics trafficking and to strengthen policing capabilities.
He said that the programmes these funds will support have been designed in close collaboration with Guyanese law enforcement entities and are ultimately to support the goals and objectives laid down by .the Government of Guyana. “Beyond the immediate financial support, such programmes will facilitate regular collaboration between Guyanese and American law enforcement counterparts, enabling for the exchange of information and international best practices,” he said while expressing confidence that that the funds will be used for the purposes intended.
Noting that these collaborative programmes already have a strong record, he said programming provided under the CBSI has facilitated counter-narcotics strategies training courses, established the Container Control Programme, provided initial training for the Serious Organized Crime Unit, created a training partnership between the Guyana Police Force and the Pennsylvania State Police, and funded riverine patrol vessels for the Guyana Defence Force. Additionally, he informed, CBSI has funded field narcotics testing kits, ballistics vests, night vision binoculars, and technical investigative equipment for Guyanese law enforcement entities.
Crime prevention
According to Hunt, the collective impact of this training and equipment, combined with renewed information sharing between US and Guyanese law enforcement entities, has already “been felt through the increased level of narcotics seizures being conducted by Guyanese law enforcement.”
He said prevention of criminality is an equally critical aspect of any effective law enforcement support programme. “Repeated research has demonstrated that creating economic opportunity for young people is among the most important tools at our disposal to undermine effective recruitment by criminal organizations,” he said adding that in order to address this challenge, USAID has continued to work in close collaboration with the Ministry of Social Protection and the Ministry of Education in order to expand programmes designed to provide work and life skills training to at-risk youth, as an integral part of the CBSI programme.
Expanded collaboration with the business sector in order to ensure that youth receiving such training are able to either find paid employment or embark on their own entrepreneurial enterprises has been an integral and vital part of this programme, he said. The United States remains committed to continued partnership in this area during the coming year, Hunt told reporters.
He said that this year the goals include additional inter-regional training opportunities to further enhance cooperation amongst neighbouring nations in their joint efforts against corruption, smuggling, and terrorism. The DEA and other US law enforcement agencies, Hunt, said will play a vital role working with Guyana law enforcement agencies to assess equipment needs and provide the necessary tools in the ongoing war on drugs and international crime. “I am especially pleased that we are able to pledge this support at a time when law enforcement agencies in Guyana are under particular stress because of the extraordinary challenges to law and order, which the country is currently undergoing,” he stressed.
He said that law enforcement and immigration entities use information provided through the programmes that fall under the initiative on a daily basis to enhance their domestic information-gathering capacity, to facilitate criminal investigations, and to protect the country’s borders.
Moving forward, the United States, through CBSI will emphasize regional institutional capacity building with a focus on expanding the initiatives detailed below, as well as new initiatives that will include supporting border security systems, anti-corruption measures, drug demand reduction, prison reform, and associated training, he said.
Later, responding on a question about the use of lie detector testing for police ranks, Hunt explained that US laws stipulates that anyone receiving training under CBSI programme has to go through human rights vetting to ensure that they have not committed “any gross human rights violation.” He said that as part of the understanding with the government, those members of CANU and the SOCU, who receive training through the drug enforcement administration undergo separate integrity testing which is handled by the Guyana government as part of its ongoing programme which is supported by the US government.
Asked about the process involved in the human rights vetting, he said it is a check by the US of all records and public sources provided by non-governmental organizations. “It is entirely a US government vetting process on the human rights side,” he said.
