Legal ways of rescuing from Interpol. A global view of the human fates from the chessboard of international arena of Interpol. Giorgi Matiashvili

      Interpol – International Criminal Police Organization, is the world’s largest organization. Currently, Interpol unites 194member states. There are branches – National Central Bureaus of Interpol in each of them. Interpol is the second international intergovernmental organization in the world in terms of the number of member countries after the UN.

      The following countries, as well as some member states of UN do not belong to Interpol: Kyrgyzstan, North Korea, San Marino, Bhutan, Kiribati, Vatican City, Turkmenistan, Solomon Islands, Tajikistan, Samoa, Vanuatu, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, Tuvalu.

      The headquarters of the organization is located in France in the city of Lyon. This is the location of the permanent central bodies of Interpol. The working languages of Interpol are English, French, Spanish and Arabic. It operates on the basis of the statute adopted in 1956. Since 1946, it has had an official mouthpiece – the Journal,,International Criminal Police Review».

      Its role is the capability, to enable the police around the world to cooperate for a safer world and public safety. Its task is to coordinate the efforts of a participant-countries in the fight against the crime for mutual benefits. Interpol’s communications network and other services provide highly effective assistance in the field of extradition and mutual legal assistance. Regardless of whether, the request is made under a treaty, under domestic law or under the principle of mutuality (The provisions of the international Covenant on civil and political rights – General Assembly Resolution 2200A (XXI), Universal Declaration of Human Rights, General Assembly Resolution 217A (III), the convention against organized crime are applicable to issues of mutual legal assistance and extradition).

      The main task is to coordinate the efforts of individual countries and pursue a unified policy in the area of cooperation on combating crime. Other main tasks include coordinating the international search, as well as combating against human trafficking, organized crime groups, drug smuggling, economic and high-tech crimes, counterfeiting, forgery of securities and child pornography. Recently, much attention has been paid to public safety and the fight against terrorism.

      Interpol has «response units», but they are not special forces, but instructors who, if necessary, help police officers from different countries, for example, if there is a very unfavorable crime situation or a large-scale event is being prepared, the security of which needs to be ensured. By itself, Interpol does not conduct investigation, prepare documents and does not announce anyone on the wanted list on its own. It is important, that Interpol ensures the cooperation of law enforcement agencies of the countries of the world, even in cases where there are no diplomatic relations between them. The sense of states participating in an international police organization is the ability to find and detain a citizen of their country, suspected of a crime, almost anywhere in the world and find and transfer to foreign colleagues the criminals wanted by them.

      &2. The role of the Interpol in mutual legal assistance and extradition

      Mutual legal assistance in criminal justice matters refers to the process by which states request and provide assistance in gathering evidences for use in criminal cases. (Model Treaty on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters and Model Treaty on Extradition are available at www.unodc.org/unodc/en/legal-tools/model-treaties-and-laws.html, also the convention against organized crime can be considered as a model or project of international cooperation in the field of extradition and mutual legal assistance).

      Extradition – in jurisprudence (delivery) (from lat. ex -,,from…. Out of,, and tradition -,,handing over,,) – a form of international cooperation of states in the fight against crime, consisting in the arrest and transfer by one state to another, at the request of the latter, persons suspected or accused of committing a crime for trial, or persons already convicted by the judicial authorities of another state for execution. In relation to the US states, this term is also used to refer to the delivery (English «rendition») of the accused from one state to another.

      That is, extradition is a formal process in which a state submits a request for the forced return of a person accused or convicted of a crime, in order for that person to come up for trial or serve a sentence in the requesting state.

      Thanks to Interpol, the ability of law enforcement agencies of states, searching for cultural and historical values, stolen cars, documents, and missing people has sharply increased. As well as, the capabilities of Interpol were actively used to develop strategic and practical solutions to ensure the safety of major sporting events/the Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, the World Cup in Brazil and etc.

      Interpol’s participation in international cooperation in the suppression of expectable or committed crimes, including by conducting, if necessary, operational search actions, is carried out within the framework of information assistance. Such assistance is carried out: – through information support of the international search and criminal records; – by providing information support for cooperation in the fight against certain types of crimes. Within the framework of Interpol, such information support is organized by the General Secretariat according to a special methodology and is regulated by: – Rules for the use of information in international police cooperation, adopted by General Assembly Resolution AG-2005-RES-15 (Berlin, 2005); – Adopted in their development by the Resolution of the General Assembly AG-2007-RES-09 (Marrakech, 2007) and supplemented by Resolution AG-2008-RES-14 (St. Petersburg, 2008), rules for the implementation of the procedures for the use of information in international police cooperation. The first of these documents contains general principles and conditions for working with information of operational interest and personal data. The second one describes in detail these principles in conformity with specific types of criminal records of Interpol and international search conducted by them.

      On the one hand, having the status of an observer in the work of the UN General Assembly, Interpol takes part in the development of draft international treaties to combat certain types of crimes within this global international organization and thereby assists the international law-making process of states in this field. At the same time, Interpol itself is not a participant of such international treaties, but many of them contain rules imposing obligations on information support for cooperation between states in the fight against crime. On the other hand, having international legal capacity, Interpol independently carries out direct law-making, which is expressed in its contractual practice and in decisions taken by the governing bodies – by the General Assembly and the Executive Committee. Forming the legal basis for cooperation with other international organizations in the field of joint activities, consulting and information exchange, technical cooperation, Interpol concluded: – Cooperation agreements with the Council of Europe (1960), the UN (1997), Organization of American states (2000), Organization of African Unity (2001), International Chamber of Commerce (2001), EUROPOL (2001), SECI Center for combating transborder crime (2002), European Central Bank (2004), International Maritime Organization (2006), UN Office on Drugs (2008), World Anti-Doping Agency (2009) and other international organizations; – Memorandums of Cooperation with the Universal Postal Union (1997), the World Customs Organization (1998), the Investigation Division of the Office of Internal Oversight Services of the United Nations (1998), UNESCO (1999), the Secretariat of the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal (1999), International Civil Aviation Organization – ICAO (2000), International Council of Museums (2000), International Center for Migration Policy Development – 2 ICMPD (2000), European Drug Monitoring Center for Drugs and Drug addiction (2001), UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (2002) and some other international organizations.

      Domestic lawmaking is implemented through the development and adoption by the General Assembly of resolutions on certain aspects of international cooperation in the fight against crime