By Raju Vernekar
Mumbai, Oct 17:
The 90th General Assembly of the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol), the world’s largest police body with 195 members, will be held in Pragati Maidan venue in New Delhi from Tuesday to Friday, October 18 to October 21.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the Assembly on October 18, while Union Home Minister Amit Shah will address the valedictory function on October 21.
Interpol, with Headquarters in Lyon (France), is the world’s largest international police organization, each represented by a National Central Bureau (NCB).
The meeting will be attended by around 2,000 overseas dignitaries, including ministers, police chiefs, police officers, and support staff from Interpol member countries, apart from Interpol head office representatives, Indian officials and media representatives, an official statement read.
In addition, the Assembly will elect the members of the Executive Committee, the governing body which provides guidance and direction in between sessions of the Assembly. The Assembly takes decisions in the form of resolutions. Each member country represented has one vote. The decision-making process is made by either a simple or two-thirds majority, depending on the subject matter.
The Assembly, meets once a year to take key decisions to bring international cooperation in law enforcement. The Interpol has 90-million records spread across 17 database. Equipped with secure global data communication channel I-24/7, incident response teams, command and control centre, a worldwide network of NCBS, the organisation assist law enforcement agencies of member countries.
All the Central and State law enforcement agencies in India have a link through Interpol New Delhi to all law enforcement agencies in other member countries, through Interpol Global Communications System for seeking and providing assistance in dealing with criminal investigations.
There is a daily inflow and outflow of communications between Interpol New Delhi and NCB of member countries which ranges from a compassionate request to locate and notify the next-of-kin of a death, request to search for a missing person, criminal history requests, requests from law enforcement agencies for informal assistance in case of fraud, commercial crime, trafficking in narcotics drugs, and criminal code offences.
The Assembly is being held in India after 25 years – it was last held in 1997. Now it culminates with celebrations for 75th year of India’s independence. The Interpol flag was handed over to India on November 25, 2021 during 89th Interpol General Assembly in Istanbul, Turkey.
Founded in 1923 as the International Criminal Police Commission (ICPC), the name Interpol served as the agency’s telegraphic address in 1946, and was chosen as its common name in 1956. India is one of the oldest members of Interpol, having joined the organization in 1949.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is designated as the NCB of India for Interpol. The Director of the CBI is the ex-officio head of the Interpol National Central Bureau-New Delhi.
India has also been one of the relatively more active members and has earlier hosted an Inter-Regional Meeting of Heads of Drug Services in 1988, the first Interpol conference on Methaqualone in 1992, the 13th Asian Regional Conference in 1994, the 66th General Assembly Session of ICPO-INTERPOL in 1997 and the Sixth Global Focal Point Conference on Asset Recovery in 2015.
To mark the 100th anniversary of the foundation of Interpol in Vienna, the annual General Assembly for the Interpol will take place in Vienna in 2023.
