JAMAICA'S AMBASSADOR to the Organisation of American States (OAS), Gordon Shirley, yesterday
formalised his Government's accession to the Inter-American Convention on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters, during a ceremony at OAS headquarters.
"The security of our hemisphere faces, today, a significant challenge from criminal activity associated with transnationally organised crime, illegal drug and firearm trafficking, and corruption," Ambassador Shirley said, in depositing the instruments of accession. The treaty on mutual legal assistance, he added, "establishes common rules to guide the co-operation among states that is integral to the effort to combat these criminal activities which have no respect for national
borders and which threaten our people and our institutions."
Jamaica is the 15th country in the hemisphere and, as Ambassador Shirley noted, the third in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), along with Trinidad and Tobago and Grenada to become a party to the treaty.
The convention was adopted in Nassau, The Bahamas, in 1992 and entered into force in 1996. It provides a framework for states to cooperate in criminal investigations, prosecutions and
proceedings by seeking assistance in such matters as summoning witnesses, taking testimony, serving documents, freezing assets and conducting searches or seizures.
INSTRUMENTS
OAS Assistant Secretary General Luigi Einaudi noted at the signing ceremony that the countries of the region need such instruments more than ever, as their legal and law enforcement systems face growing threats from transnational criminal activities.
"If we are, under such circumstances, to support the rule of law, which is fundamental to our civilised existence, then we need instruments like this, and we need to be able to make them function," Einaudi said.
