INA discusses 16 important files with the Head of the Interpol in Iraq

Baghdad-INA
 
The Head of the Arab and International Police (Interpol), Brigadier General Alaa Ashour Manati, revealed on Monday the number of wanted who arrested abroad since activating the international police file, disclosing that 35 internationally wanted vehicles were seized inside Iraq.
 
"The Directorate of Arab and International Police is concerned with the exchange of security, criminal, and judicial information between the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior and its counterparts in the Member States, whether regionally like the 22 Arab States working with the Council of Arab Interior Ministers and has a liaison unit inside Baghdad, or internationally by cooperating with 195 foreign countries, which are Interpol's central offices in those countries," Brigadier General Alaa Ashour Manati told The Iraqi News Agency-INA.
 
 
Number of international arrest warrants
 
"The number of suspects arrested since the operationalization of the Interpol file reached 265 wanted who have been extradited from abroad. For foreign or Arab defendants arrested inside Iraq, 230 are wanted. Some of them have been handed over to the countries wanting them, while the others are still detained from different nationalities,” he added. “Member States have issued 1895 international Red Notices, arriving in Iraq and circulating to all our border crossings or security services inside Iraq."
 
He stated that "Iraq has issued 2150 international arrest warrants" a Red Notice "and circulated to all Member States."
 
Impediments facing extradition of wanted persons
"There are many obstacles to the extradition of the wanted person including the dual nationality issue, if the accused is Iraqi and has another nationality so when he leaves the country and enters the State of which he is a national, this State does not extradite him to Iraq because he has another nationality, unless he is arrested outside the State of origin, only in this case he will be is extradited to the Iraqi government," he stated. "The other obstacle is the issuance of death sentences in absentia from the Iraqi judiciary for the accused, which are used by the judiciary of other countries as a winning paper and introduced as a matter of human rights."
He continued, "There are many investigative cases inside Iraq or crimes that have special penalties, but the judiciary of other countries does not consider them a punishment or a crime, and this is considered a third obstacle that prevents the extradition of wanted persons."
 
Arrest warrants against former government officials
Manati added, “With regard to the previous Government, arrest warrants have been issued for wanted officials, some of whom have been arrested and others extradited from outside the country, while others of other nationality, the file of their extradition has been sent for trial outside Iraq."
 
"Our department works under the cover of the Supreme Judicial Council and Presidency of the Public Prosecution and in coordination with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The files of the wanted defendants are organized by the presidency of Appeal of the governorates and examined by the presidency of the Public Prosecution on an objective and formal basis and sent to us for circulation to the rest of the countries."
 
The duration of enforcing the arrest warrants
 
"When we request circulating a red notice by Interpol or the Department of International Prosecution in the Council of Arab Ministers of Interior, the arrest warrant is not delaying more than three or four days until it is circulated to all States. But there are legal procedures within the international organization and within the Council of Arab Ministers of the Interior for the Chamber of Prosecution for the legal scrutiny of Iraq's request, for issuing an arrest warrant and circulating it to other States," he affirmed.
 
Confiscation of funds
The Head of Arab and International Police (INTERPOL) noted that "the confiscation of funds is based on a judicial decision and in two ways INTERPOL and diplomatic contexts through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but till now we didn’t receive such notice while there are previous procedures in this context and these States have been requested to follow up from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs."
 
 He pointed out that "there is a rapid response to the subjects to which we are charged, , because they are important matters relating to the security of the State, terrorism and the theft of State funds, and they are quickly responded within one or two days."
 
 
 
 
Recovering the Funds 
 
"Recovering the Fund from abroad is the responsibility of the Federal Integrity Commission, specifically the recovering the Fund Service." He noted that "coordination continues with the Integrity Commission, especially after the activation of the role of the recovering the Fund Department, which was supervised by the Chairman of the Integrity Commission and the Director General of Recovery in cooperation with the Arab and International Police Directorate, to arrest the wanted accused of the Authority, which is implemented by our Department, while sending joint detachments by us and integrity to extradite the accused."
 
Where are INTERPOL offices located in Iraq?
 
He pointed out that "The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Muhammad S. Al-Sudani, and the Minister of Interior, Abdul Amir Al-Shammari, agreed to open Interpol offices at all land, sea and air border crossings, as these offices are located in all Iraqi airports and work in them is electronic by checking all passports inside Iraq or abroad, in coordination with the Iraqi National Intelligence Service”.
 
Electronic procedure
He stated that " the paper based system has been stopped with all border crossings in addition to security services inside Iraq and electronic Interpol databases have been linked and communicated to the office of the National Centre and all official services to benefit from its services."
 "One of INTERPOL's databases has been used in Iraq. It is the database of stolen passports of all countries of the world. It has been delivered electronically to the Directorate of General Passports and is checked by them at headquarters and at border crossings."
 
"The databases of the wheels stolen from the countries of the world reached the General Traffic Directorate electronically and all the wheels currently in existence were checked to indicate their position on the Interpol thefts, after which the transaction for their registration within Iraq was completed,"
He stated that "this measure achieved very significant results, as a large number of stolen wheels from all countries of the world were seized, and their judicial procedures were organized and delivered to the countries requesting them after completing their procedures. Stolen motorcycles at exorbitant prices were also seized, especially from Britain, Germany, and other foreign countries." Pointing out that “the number of internationally requested wheels that were seized inside Iraq is 35, as these wheels were stolen from Arab and foreign countries, the last of which is a Land Cruiser model 2023, which was stolen from one of the Arab countries and was seized inside Iraq within 7 days.”
Arrest orders against ISIS terrorist members
 
He explained: "The Federal Investigation and Intelligence Agency-FIIA exerted its utmost efforts to circulate the arrest warrants issued against the accused who were in ISIS terrorist gangs and their names are too many. Blue notices were organized against them by Interpol's Baghdad office and circulated to all States. These notices resulted in the arrest and extradite of many ISIS suspects outside Iraq including five accused senior ISIS leaders in Nineveh province who were extradited from Syria ".
 
As for criminal cases, Manati stated that “an accused of a murder in Maysan Governorate was extradited a few days ago from Iran, and currently he has been referred to the judiciary to receive his just punishment.”

He pointed out that "when ISIS gangs took over some areas, they stole passports. However, when our electronic system was entered based on the letter of the Director of General Passports and circulated to all countries, many of these passports were matched and we arrested Syrian and Iraqi defendants, including the holders of these raw passports which were recovered by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
 
Issuing an international bulletin on financial crimes
He pointed out that "based on the instructions issued by the international organization and the interest of the Secretary General of Interpol, Jürgen Stock, and due to the large number of private financial crimes, all countries were asked to provide them with private financial crimes for the purpose of issuing the bulletin, which is in the process of issuing because it requires special cadres and a budget, as It will be responsible for following up and tracking the effects of money stolen from all countries of the world,” he explained,  “this bulletin will be provided to the Integrity Commission, and the international organization has completed 80 percent of it, and what remains is the logistical matters to be circulated to all countries."
International cooperation
He indicated that "there are many cooperating countries, including the State of Oman, where two general managers were recovered and arrested inside Muscat along with a suspect against whom a criminal case was issued, and an arrest and extradition order was issued from Egypt, in addition to the recovery of many suspects wanted by the Iraqi judiciary, whether from Syria and Jordan And the Emirates, Iran, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Kuwait, as all these countries are cooperating with us."
He stressed the necessity of "the presence of bilateral or multilateral memorandums regarding the recovery of wanted persons or accused, whether they are Iraqis or foreigners inside Iraq as for the European countries, if there is an agreement with any of them, the wanted will be handed over to us however, if there is no agreement, the wanted persons will not be handed over except with personal intervention by the General Secretariat of Interpol and at the direction of the concerned country."
He stated, "We conducted handover operations, not just receipt, with all Arab countries, as we arrested wanted Arabs inside Iraq, and after completing the judicial procedures and the approval of the President of the Supreme Judicial Council, Faiq Zidan, and Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein, they were handed over to their countries," pointing out that "agreements will be concluded multiple or bilateral with other countries to extradite wanted persons."
Cyber security
The Director of Arab and International Police confirmed that "there is a special unit of the International Organization of Interpol for cyber security, and its doors are always open to all Interpol offices in the world, including Iraq, and there is direct contact and contact with the departments concerned with cyber security, whether they are at the intelligence agency or our office to provide assistance in all Subjects", pointing out that "the issue of electronic extortion outside the country is through our approach and the necessary procedure and in coordination with the special investigation judge of Interpol to issue an arrest warrant against the owner of the site and to take judicial measures quickly, whether he is Iraqi or abroad through the offices of Interpol according to cooperation between countries."
Mechanism to extradite the wanted outside Iraq
He stressed that "the judicial procedures to extradite an accused wanted outside Iraq are carried out by submitting a request to the competent judge stating that the accused is outside Iraq and requesting that he be prosecuted internationally through Interpol, where special procedures for the recovery file are completed within the competent court by publishing information about the accused and details of an arrest warrant in both copies Arabic and English, which are organized by the competent court and sent to the Directorate of Public Prosecution in order to request an international search warrant for this accused,” pointing out that “this is checked by the Directorate of Public Prosecution and transferred to the Arab and international police, in order for us to complete the generalization procedures, whether on the regional side or International."
 
Border crossings 
 
He stated that "Iraq's first safe fist line is the border crossing points, whether land, sea or air, headed by the Gateway Authority and the cooperation of existing agencies, whether it be the Iraqi National Intelligence Service, INTERPOL offices, passports and accommodation all departments have one family working to deter criminals who have carried out operations outside the borders there is a privileged activity in arresting many defendants."
 
Foreign labor 
 
He pointed out that "the mechanism confirms that foreign workers are free from those internationally wanted, through the point of contact with the Residence Directorate that grants entry visas, as entry visas are not granted to any person unless the Interpol databases are checked, whether in his country or in a non-state."
 
He stated, "We work with electronic auditing at all border crossings," pointing out that "an agreement has been signed with the Iraqi National Intelligence Service regarding linking databases at border crossings for electronic auditing, with the distribution of Interpol offices at border crossings and airports, whether land, sea or air."
 
Networking 
 
He stated that “the networking project was implemented with Interpol’s databases at all border crossings and security departments inside Iraq,” pointing out that “the networking project was supported by the International Organization of Interpol and with direct support from the US Department of State, as this linking connects the auditing databases whether It was on the passports or wheels of defendants wanted by international arrest warrants that were located inside the border crossings."
 
Similar names
 
He stressed that "the problems of similar names have been solved, especially double names, because the information in the arrest warrants currently issued is complete and includes the full or full name and surname along with the name of the mother and her children."