By Sami Zaptia.
London, 3 July 2020:
Fathi Bashagha, the Interior Minister of Libya’s Internationally recognized government in Tripoli, tweeted on his personal account yesterday that the new INTERPOL office in Tripoli has been launched. The news was surprisingly not available on his Ministry’s official media page.
Bashagha said that the new office was ‘‘an important step forward in fighting terrorism, organized crime and human trafficking’’. The new office, he added, had ‘‘enhanced by modern capabilities’’, but offered no further details.
‘‘Cooperation with INTERPOL HQ is another step towards empowering relationships with international partners’’, he concluded.
It will be recalled that in August 2018 the Tripoli government’s Ministry of Interior had revealed that INTERPOL had resumed its ‘‘normal work’’ in Libya after the lifting its embargo on Libya.
The lifting of this embargo came after the payment by Libya of all its outstanding contributions to Interpol, the Ministry had said.
The Ministry had also revealed that a delegation from Interpol’s counter-terrorism unit had visited Libya, visiting several Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Interior locations in order to ‘‘begin a process of linking the latest counter-terrorism regulations as part of INTERPOL’s ‘‘Project First’’.
The Ministry of Interior had further reported that ‘‘coordination was established with Interpol to ensure that Libya was among the beneficiaries of the ‘‘I-one project’’ in support of African State’’. I-ONE gives access to a criminal database network.
Libya’s accession to the ‘‘Flyway project’’ to combat human trafficking had also been discussed as well as a link to Interpol’s Illicit Arms Records and Tracing Management System (IARMS) to trace lost and stolen firearms.
The Ministry of Interior had also reported that it had taken steps to join INTERPOL’s operation TRIGGER to counter terrorism and reduce weapons trafficking and proliferation.
