Prosecutors from Latin America and Europe specialized in operations against drug trafficking. They strengthened their cooperation in the framework of a working conference organized in Valencia from December 11 to 14, 2023, under the title ‘Transnational investigations on drug trafficking: alliances between Latin American and European Anti-Drug Prosecutor’s Offices’. The European Union’s cooperation program COPOLAD III participated in the meeting, contributing the results of its work on special investigation techniques and on the gender perspective in cases of drug trafficking and human trafficking.
The meeting kicked off on Monday 11 with a meeting of the RFAI working group which, with technical assistance from COPOLAD III. COPOLAD is responsible for preparing a protocol on the use of special investigative techniques in the investigation of organized and transnational drug trafficking. The objective is to formulate a diagnosis of the domestic and international norms applicable to these special techniques, as well as their practical functioning, both domestically and from the perspective of international cooperation.
Gender dimension
The annual meeting of the contact points of the Network of Anti-Drug Prosecutors of Ibero-America was held on Tuesday 12. During the meeting, COPOLAD III presented a first advance of the diagnosis on undercover agents, as well as the initial result of its work on the gender dimension in the relationship between drug trafficking and human trafficking, an action developed in collaboration with three AIAMP networks: the Ibero-American Network of Specialized Prosecutors against Trafficking in Persons and Smuggling of Migrants (REDTRAM), the RFAI and the Specialized Gender Network (REG). The aim is to understand the relationship between manifestations of organized crime and gender, concretized in human trafficking and drug trafficking, with a view to strengthening the capacities of AIAMP prosecutors to comprehensively address investigations where the international drug trade has a differentiated impact on women victims of trafficking.
On the 13th and 14th, Latin American prosecutors were joined by anti-drug prosecutors from different European countries. These two days, inaugurated by the Spanish Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortíz, the President of the Generalitat Valenciana, Carlos Mazón, and the Chief Prosecutor of the Anti-Drug Prosecutor’s Office of Spain, Rosa Ana Morán, were dedicated to strengthening cooperation between prosecutors on both sides of the Atlantic, with particular attention to special investigative techniques – controlled deliveries and undercover agents – as well as to the development of a new approach to drug trafficking.
Participants
The meeting was organized by the Anti-Drug Prosecutor’s Office of Spain and the Network of Anti-Drug Prosecutors of Ibero-America (RFAI), part of the Ibero-American Association of Public Prosecutors (AIAMP), and was supported by COPOLAD III. It was attended by prosecutors from Spain, France, Portugal, Belgium, Italy, the Netherlands, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Paraguay and the Dominican Republic, as well as representatives of the FIIAPP, the RFAI, the Conference of Ministers of Justice of Ibero-American Countries (COMJIB) and COPOLAD III.
