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While developments in electronic communications and
information technology, transport and trade offer countries
many economic and social benefits, they also pose new
and complex crime prevention and investigation problems
for governments, law enforcement agencies, banking
and financial institutions. The freer movement of people,
money, goods, services and ideas creates institutional
vulnerability and opportunities upon which organised
criminal activity thrives. In 1997, the Study Group
on Transnational Crime of the Asia Pacific Council
for Security Co-operation identified 19 crime types
impacting on regional security. Examples are narcotics
production and trafficking, firearms and people trafficking,
smuggling, fraud, corruption, money laundering, internet
crime, paedophile activity, natural resources poaching
and illegal shipment of hazardous waste.
As traditional national borders become less of a
barrier to criminals, everyday policing is being internationalised.
However, the resulting cooperative enforcement practices
and extensions of municipal law lead to a multiplicity
of jurisdictional problems. Moreover, the increasing
sophistication of multi-jurisdictional crime requires
at least as sophisticated a response employing new
knowledge, skills, technology, mandates and lines of
communication. In particular, the multi-disciplinary
skills required in transnational crime prevention and
investigation, additional to those necessary for traditional
policing work, include specialised legal, commercial,
information technology and political skills. The Centre
will develop as a focal point for exchange of information
and research on these matters among Asian and Pacific
countries.
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