LYON, France – INTERPOL has published the first INTERPOL-United Nations Security Council Special Notices for individuals who are the targets of UN sanctions against Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
Among the names of individuals on this first group of four notices is Ahmad Fadil Nazal Al-Khalayleh (alias Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi), one of the world’s most notorious terrorist suspects, wanted by police in a number of countries for a series of major attacks on behalf of Al Qaeda.
The new notices are being distributed to all of INTERPOL’s 184 member countries using the organization’s global police communications system. If the whereabouts of suspects named in such notices become known to police, the INTERPOL National Central Bureau in the country concerned will be notified immediately so that competent authorities can take the necessary action to implement the UN sanctions against them.
A United Nations Security Council resolution unanimously adopted on 29 July 2005 called on the UN Secretary General to work with INTERPOL to provide better tools to assist the United Nations Security Council’s ‘1267 Committee’ to carry out its mandate regarding the freezing of assets, travel bans and arms embargos aimed at groups and individuals associated with Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
The creation of the INTERPOL-United Nations Security Council Special Notice was approved formally by INTERPOL’s General Assembly in Berlin in September 2005, and a team at the INTERPOL General Secretariat in Lyon, France, was immediately assigned to work with UN officials on details of implementation and related technical issues.
‘I believe publication of these new notices will send an important message to the international community that INTERPOL and the United Nations are working together in a proactive manner to ensure that terrorists are brought to justice,’ INTERPOL Secretary General Ronald K. Noble said. ‘I think the very fact that notices of this sort are being published will have a significant effect on the movement of terrorist suspects across international borders and will make it less likely they will engage in financial dealings or the purchase of weapons.’
The Consolidated List on Al Qaeda and the Taliban maintained by the UN Security Council 1267 Committee contains the names of more than 300 suspects and more than 100 entities. The UN and INTERPOL will work together to issue additional special notices in the future for many of the individuals on the list.
‘The INTERPOL-UN Special Notices make clear the common commitment of the United Nations and INTERPOL to fight terrorism. They will also provide a considerable boost to the implementation of the UN-mandated sanctions on terrorists and their supporters throughout the world,’ s aid the Chairman of the UN 1267 Committee, Ambassador César Mayoral of Argentina.
Abridged versions of the four new notices, including Al-Zarqawi’s, may be seen on INTERPOL’s website. Full details on the notices, including fingerprints and other confidential police data, are available only to law enforcement officials through INTERPOL channels. For more information on the Al Qaeda and Taliban Sanctions Committee, please visit http://www.un.org/Docs/sc/committees/1267Template.htm.
INTERPOL has a long history of co-operation with the United Nations. In November 2004 INTERPOL opened an office at the United Nations in New York and appointed its first Special Representative, Dr. Ulrich Kersten, a former president of the Bundeskriminalamt (BKA) German Federal Criminal Police, to further enhance co-operation and communication between the organizations.
The new INTERPOL-United Nations Security Council Special Notices are an example of the kind of operational results coming from this collaboration. INTERPOL officers were also recently invited to Beirut to assist the UN investigation into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri.