Sri Lanka: Advancing a comprehensive national strategy to counter organized crime

Colombo, Sri Lanka/19 November 2025: Organized crime poses a critical challenge to governance, security, justice systems, and economic development. It deepens community vulnerabilities and erodes trust in institutions. From drug trafficking and financial crimes to corruption and exploitation, criminal groups increasingly operate across borders and adapt rapidly, making traditional enforcement responses insufficient. Such evolving threats underscore the need for strong coordination, clear strategic direction and sustained responses.

In response, the Government of Sri Lanka, with technical support of UNODC, is undertaking the development of a comprehensive national strategy to prevent and counter organized crime. Aligned with the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC) and international good practices, the strategy is structured around four core pillars: preventing criminal infiltration, pursuing organized criminal groups and their illicit proceeds, protecting affected individuals and communities, and strengthening partnerships at the national, regional, and international levels.

Over the past year, Sri Lanka has made steady progress in drafting this framework through a dedicated Technical Working Group comprising key government institutions and civil society representatives. Together, they have refined the strategy’s objectives, priority activities, implementation mechanisms, and monitoring and evaluation components.

A major milestone in this process was a recently held multi-stakeholder consultation, which convened 47 experts from government, civil society, international development partners, and the private sector. The consultation served as a critical platform for collective review of the draft strategy and for generating actionable recommendations to strengthen its finalization.

Discussions reinforced the importance of integrating human rights, gender perspectives, and community protection into all areas of the strategy. Participants agreed that these elements are critical for ensuring that responses are not only effective, but also equitable and protective of those most affected by organized crime.

A core impact of the consultation was its ability to bring together all actors who will be responsible for implementing the strategy. Engaging frontline implementers was aimed at strengthening the strategy’s practicality and long-term sustainability. Participants emphasized that such collective engagement is essential for building a coordinated response capable of addressing criminal networks that operate across communities and borders.

This activity contributed to SDG 5, SDG 16 and SDG 17: https://sdg-tracker.org/

(Supported by the United Kingdom)