CARICC - Central Asian Regional Information and Coordination Centre for Combating Illicit Trafficking of Narcotic Drugs, Psychotropic Substances and their Precursors In response to the need to improve inter-agency cooperation between law enforcement agencies at a national, regional and international level to counter the problem of drug trafficking from Afghanistan, in late 2004 the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (

UNODC The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC; French: ''Office des Nations unies contre la drogue et le crime'') is a United Nations office that was established in 1997 as the Office for Drug Control and Crime Prevention by combining the ...

) together with the parties to a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on sub-regional drug control cooperation

Azerbaijan Azerbaijan (, ; az, Azərbaycan ), officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, , also sometimes officially called the Azerbaijan Republic is a transcontinental country located at the boundary of Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is a part of th ...

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...

Kyrgyzstan Kyrgyzstan,, pronounced or the Kyrgyz Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Asia. Kyrgyzstan is bordered by Kazakhstan to the north, Uzbekistan to the west, Tajikistan to the south, and the People's Republic of China to the east. ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

Turkmenistan Turkmenistan ( or ; tk, Türkmenistan / Түркменистан, ) is a country located in Central Asia, bordered by Kazakhstan to the northwest, Uzbekistan to the north, east and northeast, Afghanistan to the southeast, Iran to the sout ...

Tajikistan Tajikistan (, ; tg, Тоҷикистон, Tojikiston; russian: Таджикистан, Tadzhikistan), officially the Republic of Tajikistan ( tg, Ҷумҳурии Тоҷикистон, Jumhurii Tojikiston), is a landlocked country in Centr ...

and

Uzbekistan Uzbekistan (, ; uz, Ozbekiston, italic=yes / , ; russian: Узбекистан), officially the Republic of Uzbekistan ( uz, Ozbekiston Respublikasi, italic=yes / ; russian: Республика Узбекистан), is a doubly landlocked cou ...

launched a project to establish a Central Asian Regional Information and Coordination Centre (CARICC). On 7–8 February 2006, the institutional documents on the establishment of CARICC, developed by the experts of the participating countries and UNODC, were endorsed at the seventh ministerial review meeting of the parties to MOU held in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Almaty, Kazakhstan was agreed as a location of the Centre. The purpose of the Centre is to facilitate information exchange and analysis, and to assist in the coordination of operational activities of the various law enforcement agencies in the region – police, drug control agencies, customs, border guards, security services of the countries involved. These objectives have yet to be achieved. Activities of the Centre are supported by core staff (selected on a competitive basis from the law enforcement agencies of the participating countries) and by liaison officers from each of the participating states attached to it. Provision is also made for other interested countries and international organisations such as

Interpol The International Criminal Police Organization (ICPO; french: link=no, Organisation internationale de police criminelle), commonly known as Interpol ( , ), is an international organization that facilitates worldwide police cooperation and cri ...

, Europol,

World Customs Organization The World Customs Organization (WCO) is an intergovernmental organization headquartered in Brussels, Belgium. The WCO works on customs-related matters including the development of international conventions, instruments, and tools on topics suc ...

to post liaison officers to CARICC to facilitate cooperation and information flow. The institutional document of CARICC is the "Agreement on Establishment of CARICC", which was signed by the presidents of all member states. The Agreement on Establishment of CARICC entered into force on 22 March 2009 following its ratification by the parliaments of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. Russian Federation ratified CARICC Agreement on 9 March 2011. On December 9, 2009 the Office of CARICC was officially inaugurated in Almaty. Afghanistan, Austria, Canada, China, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Pakistan, Romania, Turkey, Ukraine, USA,

and SELEC, have observer status at CARICC. The project on establishment of CARICC is implemented by the UNODC - its Regional Office for Central Asia (ROCA)Official site of UNODC ROCA
/ref> with project staff based in Almaty, Kazakhstan. The project is mainly funded the U.S. Other donors of the project were Canada, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Turkey and UK.

External links

Pakistan Press Foundation

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Caricc Drug control law enforcement agencies