As part of an effort to tackle crime cohesively, the Guyana Police Force yesterday handed over intelligence and information on a wide range of criminal activities to their Surinamese counterparts who were in Guyana on an exchange visit.
Assistant Police Commissioner of Suriname, Guno Roosenhoff headed a small delegation of police, customs and other law enforcement agents to Guyana during the two-day visit which concluded yesterday. The meeting was held to discuss key law enforcement issues and was also an opportunity to establish points of contact with personnel in key positions.
The files handed over consisted of information on wanted persons, smuggling, missing persons and other types of organized crime. The Guyana Revenue Authority’s Customs and Trade Adminis-tration also presented to the Surinamese Police a file on the movement of vehicles to and from the neighbouring countries.
Commissioner of Police, Seelall Persaud during a press conference yesterday afternoon told the media that among the shared information was, “trends, flow trends, organized, criminal syndicates on both sides, wanted persons on both sides, missing persons – and missing persons is significant when it comes to dealing with trafficking in persons, because they may be reported as a missing person in one country, but in fact they may have been trafficked to another country”.
This collaboration according to Persaud is expected to continue since it has proven to be very effective. “….Not only because it has been very fruitful, but recently there have been several interactions between the two police forces,” Persaud said, as he made reference to a trafficking in person case which was investigated, a piracy case, and the recent handing over of Barry Dataram”.
During April this year, Persaud along with other senior law enforcement officials travelled to Suriname for a meeting hosted in Nickerie, during which issues such as drug trafficking, human trafficking, piracy, money laundering and the smuggling of contraband items were discussed. An agreement was also reached to hold the discussions annually in both territories.
The Commissioner of Police touched on several issues that the two law enforcement bodies have been working together to combat, with smuggling being the main interest. “All other issues including smuggling to evade taxes would have been a role of Customs, that the Police and CANU would have lent support…smuggling of narcotics, firearms and banned items is target based and [we] have been doing that jointly with our counterpart”, he said, while noting that an enhanced agreement is likely to be put in place.
However, as it relates to piracy, Persaud noted that Guyana has had only one such report for the entire year.
Other members of the visiting team from Suriname included Region Commandant of Nickerie, Wiedjaikumar Oedit, Assistant Superintendent and Chief Narcotic Branch Officer, Glen Fernand and Assistant Superintendent and Acting International Affairs Officer, Bryan Isaacs
