Brasilia, Brazil. During a three-day forum, organized by UNODC’s Global Firearms Programme (GFP), in the city of Brasilia from 12 to 14 of April, representatives from various Member States from Latin America (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile and Paraguay) stressed the need for enhancing international cooperation to fight against the illicit trafficking of firearms in the region. The meeting gathered, magistrates, prosecutors and law enforcement officers from the different participating countries and was aimed at strengthening capacities related to international judicial and police cooperation and the preservation and obtaining of electronic evidence in the case of arms trafficking. The workshop also addressed the specific problems of firearms trafficking in the Latin American continent: the most frequent modus operandi for the illicit manufacture of firearms, and their entry to black markets and cross-border trafficking. Participants agreed on the need to strengthen collaboration between countries through the use of the different existing international cooperation tools at the regional level, such as the ones provided by INTERPOL, EUROPOL, the ATF, the Ibero-American Association of Public Prosecutors (AIAMP for its acronym in Spanish), the Ibero-American Network for International Legal Cooperation (IberRed for its acronym in Spanish) and the GFP’s Community of Practitioners.
The meeting, aimed at defining, developing and promoting higher standards in investigations and in the prosecution of illicit trafficking of firearms and related or associated crimes, served as a platform where the representatives of the different States shared experiences that were enriching for the development of investigations related to organized crime and transnational arms trafficking.
The opening ceremony was in charge of the Ambassador of the Delegation of the European Union to Brazil, Ignacio Ybáñez; the Director of Investigation and Fight against Organized Crime and Corruption of the Federal Police of Brazil, Ricardo Andrade Saadi; the chief of the UNODC Firearms Trafficking Section, Simonetta Grassi; and with the coordination and moderation of Lucía Gómez Consoli, regional coordinator of the Programme in Latin America.
This workshop was organized by the UNODC Global Firearms Programme with the financial support of the project DISRUPT, that is part of the Global Illicit Flows Programme of the European Union.
This project is funded by the European Union
