Kenya hosts Africa police heads meeting, vows to step up cooperation with Interpol

Kenya has pledged to strengthen its collaboration with International Criminal Police Organization, Interpol, in the fight against organized transnational crime.

Speaking on Wednesday during the kickoff of a meeting of Africa’s police heads in Nairobi, Interior Cabinet Secretary Dr. Fred Matiang’i said Kenya was keen to deepen partnerships in the fight against terrorism, radicalisation and the trafficking of drugs, human beings and counterfeits.

“Kenya is cooperating with international partners to fight Transnational Organized Crime, including the Regional Operation Centre Khartoum (ROCK). We will continue working closely with our neighbours to better protect our citizens,” said Dr. Matiang’i.

He was addressing the 10th meeting of the African Union Mechanism for Police Cooperation (AFRIPOL) whose agenda is the review of the strategic, operational and tactical cooperation among member states’ police units.

This is the first time Kenya is hosting a meeting of AFRIPOL whose current chairperson is Kenya’s Inspector General of Police Hilary Mutyambai.

CS. Matiang’i noted that the Kenyan AFRIPOL office at the DCI Headquarters in Nairobi is already running having benefited from Interpol’s support.

The CS urged member countries to pool resources in intelligence-gathering and information sharing and harmonise border-monitoring policies to counter emerging security threats such as cybercrime, identity theft, phone frauds and phishing schemes.

 “Combating international crime is an expensive undertaking. Rising transnational crime and the complex nature of some of it obliges governments to allocate more resources to security budgets. Spending more in intelligence gathering, policy reforms, costly equipment and more officers for strategic deployment has become inevitable,” he said. 

Interpol President, Maj-Gen, Dr. Ahmed Nasser Al-Raisi, who also addressed the meeting, urged for more joint AFRIPOL-Interpol operations.

Earlier during another meeting with CS Matiang’i at Harambee House, Majr-Gen Al-Raisi promised to raise the share of Africa’s consumption of intelligence sourced from Interpol to at least 20% from the current one percent.

The Interpol president who hails from the United Arab Emirates also pledged to end the current under-representation of Africans in the global police agency by ensuring more African security officers are recruited into its ranks.

Kenya actively supported the candidature of Majr-Gen Al-Raisi to the four-year term elective post and hopes to benefit from his leadership through favourable opportunities for partnership.

Majr-Gen Al-Raisi noted Interpol had netted successes including in the Operation FlashIPPA that resulted in 2000 arrests and the seizure of 12 million illicit products in an exercise that involved 20 countries participating.

At the same time, Operation Golden Strike involving 23 Africa and Asia countries led to the seizure of 50 rhino horns, four tonnes of ivory, half tonnes of pangolin and the arrest of more than 100 suspects.