Funded by the European Union |
The Government of the Plurinational State of Bolivia and UNODC inaugurated the work room of the Joint Airport Interdiction Task Force (JAITF) of the Airport Communications Project (AIRCOP) at Viru Viru International Airport on 29 October 2018.
AIRCOP, financed by the European Union within the framework of the "Cocaine Route Programme", is implemented by UNODC in collaboration with the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) and the World Customs Organization (WCO). AIRCOP is a multi-agency project based on the cooperation between UNODC, INTERPOL, and WCO, aiming at strengthening the capacities of participating international airports in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Middle East to detect and intercept drugs, other illicit goods and high-risk passengers in both origin, transit and destination countries. Its overall objective is to disrupt illegal criminal networks.
The work room at the Viru Viru airport will allow the JAITF to be connected to other JAITFs in more than 30 countries in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. This elite group is composed, in Bolivia, of 18 members, of which 3 are INTERPOL officials, 3 from Migration services, 3 from the Citizen Security Aeropolicial Service, 4 from the Bolivian Customs and 5 from the Special Force to Fight Against Drug Trafficking (FELCN). These officials will be highly trained in detecting not only drug trafficking, but also human trafficking victims and migrants, forgery, arms trafficking, undeclared currency traffic and high-risk passenger flows linked to terrorism.
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Inauguration ceremony of Task Force |
Mr. Carlos Romero Bonifaz, Minister of Government, Mr. Felipe Cáceres, Deputy Minister of Social Defense and Controlled Substances, Col. Marco Antonio Ibáñez, Director of the FELCN, Mr. Tofik Murshudlu, Head of the Drug Control and Crime Prevention Section of UNODC, Mr. Sergio Naranjo, AIRCOP Coordinator for Latin America and the Caribbean, and Mr. Thierry Rostan, UNODC Country Officce in Bolivia (COBOL) Representative, participated to the ceremony of inauguration of the work room. There were also senior executives of the participating agencies, including the National Customs, General Directorate of Migration, INTERPOL, the Citizen Security Public Service and the Minister Counselor of the Delegation of the European Union in Bolivia, Mr. Joerg Schreiber.
Mr. Sergio Naranjo, AIRCOP Regional Coordinator for Latin America and the Caribben |
Mr. Thierry Rostan, UNODC Country Office in Bolivia (COBOL) Representative |
The project, funded by the European Union, Canada, Japan, the United States of America, the Netherlands, Norway and France, was initially designed in 2010 as part of the European Union's Cocaine Route Programme. Since then, it has expanded its scope to cover multiple threats targeting airports and is geographically covering over 30 countries, including 24 airports with an operational JAITF and 5 associate countries in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean and the Middle East.
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