APS : Wednesday, 06 September 2017
ALGIERS- Police Chief Major General Abdelghani Hamel, head of the African Police Cooperation Mechanism (Afripol),
stressed Wednesday, in The Hague (Holland), the need to “unify efforts and views” with the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol) to face security threats and fight against cross-border crime.
In a meeting with Europol’s Director Rob Wainwright, on the sidelines of the second meeting “Euromed-police IV” in its 4th edition, Major General Hamel said that this union “must be done through “the exchange of information and experiences and the strengthening of training and skills for those responsible for the enforcement of the law notably the African police bodies,” said a communiqué of the General Directorate of the National Police (DGSN).
The meeting was an opportunity to examine “ways of cooperation and coordination among the regional police institutions, namely Europol and Afripol, to unify the views and efforts in order to fight against all forms of crime threatening the security of people and communities in Europe and Africa,” said the communiqué.
In his capacity as chairman of Afripol, Hamel seized the opportunity to review “the main lines of the mechanism’s action programme since its creation and the holding of its general Assembly in Algerian in May 2017, mainly devoted to supporting police bodies of the African countries in terms of strengthening of the fields of training, communication and logistic support, necessary to carry out their tasks.
For his part, Europol’s head welcomed the new organization of the regional police, namely the mechanism of Afripol, which is a “qualitative support for the international and regional alliance against crime in all its forms,” also welcoming “the efficient and particular role of Algeria in the implementation of this mechanism of African police, in view of its pioneering experience in the fight against cross-border crime, including organized crime, terrorism, cyber-crime as well as drug and psychoactive trafficking.”
