News item | 31-10-2022 | 13:32
The international approach to organized crime is reinforced by mutual agreements between the Netherlands and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). To this end, Minister Yeşilgöz-Zegerius of Justice and Security and Minister Hoekstra of Foreign Affairs submitted two bilateral treaties with the UAE to the House of Representatives today; one on mutual legal assistance and one on extradition.
According to Minister Yeşilgöz-Zegerius, the mutual agreements with the UAE are of great importance in the fight against organized crime in general, and the fight against financial and economic crime in particular. Due to worldwide drug smuggling, a lot of illegally earned money is in circulation internationally that criminals try to launder and keep out of sight of governments. The past few years have shown that the UAE is an important partner for the Netherlands in tackling organized crime and criminal money flows. The treaties further strengthen the cooperation that has been built up between the Netherlands and the UAE.
“Huge sums of criminal money are made with the international drug trade. Violent and ruthless criminals are crossing all our borders in an attempt to further their wrong practices and illegally earned money. Organized crime poses a serious threat to our society and democratic constitutional state through intimidation and violence. We must not allow criminals to escape simply because they travel to another country and abuse the financial and economic infrastructure worldwide. We can act more effectively against this through more international cooperation.”
said Minister Yeşilgöz-Zegerius.
Last year, Minister Yeşilgöz-Zegerius’ predecessor in office signed the treaties with his fellow UAE Justice Minister in Abu Dhabi. In order for the treaties to enter into force, they are submitted for approval to the House of Representatives and the States of Aruba, Curaçao and Sint Maarten by means of two bills.
Act faster
The treaties for legal aid and extradition will enable the investigative services of both countries to respond more quickly to each other ‘s requests for criminal justice cooperation . The treaties contain agreements on hearing suspects, witnesses, victims or experts, investigating bank accounts and seizing goods and profits derived from illegal practices. Furthermore, the possibilities for cooperation in extradition cases will be broadened.
With the bilateral treaties, too, each request for legal assistance and extradition is assessed separately on the basis of legal and treaty frameworks. For example, they will not cooperate with requests for legal assistance and extradition if there are good reasons to believe that the suspect is being persecuted because of his religion, political opinion, nationality, race or ethnic group. The Netherlands also asks for guarantees about not imposing or carrying out the death penalty and corporal punishment if this is the case in the other country. Without such guarantees, legal assistance or extradition will not be possible.