Transnational organized crime in West Africa: The additional challenge

International Affairs

Volumn 83, Issue 6, 2007, Pages 1071-1090

  Mazzitelli, Antonio L ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 35549012898     PISSN: 00205850     EISSN: 14682346     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-2346.2007.00674.x     Document Type: Article

References (121)

1. New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD), adopted by the African Union (AU) at the 37th session of the Assembly of Heads of State and Government, July 2001, Lusaka, Zambia; New Global Compact for Africa's Recovery, adopted by the UN Economic Commission for Africa, Conference of African Ministers of Finance, Algiers, 8-10 May 2001 (based on plans and resolutions on Africa adopted by the UN at the Millennium Summit of Sept. 2000); Africa Action Plan, adopted by the G8, Kananalis, Canada, 2002, and subsequent G8 declaration at the Gleneagles Summit of 2005; Our common interest: Report of the Commission for Africa (London: The Stationery Office, March 2005);
2. EU strategy fir Africa: towards a Euro-African pact to accelerate African development (Brussels : Commission of the European Communities, Oct. 2005) ;
3. Plan de acción para Africa Subsahariana 2005-2008 (Madrid: Ministerio de Assuntos Exteriores y de Cooperación, June 2006).
4. World Bank, World Development Indicators 2006 (Washington DC, April 2006). Data in this document show a remarkable recovery in sub-Saharan Africa's growth since 2000. Twenty of the region's 48 countries grew by more than 5% in 2004. The surge in oil exports and the boom in the price of oil have helped, pushing up growth rates among oil producers such as Angola, Chad, Nigeria and Sudan. But 15 non-oil-producing countries have had an average growth rate of 5.3% since 1995, demonstrating their potential for long-term growth.
5. International Crisis Group (ICG), Fuelling the Niger Delta crisis, Africa Report 118, Sept. 2006;
6. ICG, The swamps of insurgency: Nigeria's Delta unrest, Africa Report 115, 3 Aug. 2006.
7. ICG, Guinea: change or chaos, Africa Report 121, 14 Feb. 2007.
8. The Sahelian band region is known for hosting logistic bases of the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat which recently renamed itself Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb.
9. ICG, Chad: back towards war?, Africa Report in, 1 June 2006.
10. Report of the Secretary General on the situation in the Central African Republic and the activities of the United Nations Peace-building Support Office in the Central African Republic, United Nations S/2007/376, 22 June 2007.
11. United Nations Development Programme, World Human Development Report 2006 (New York, 2006). The report lists 177 countries. Because of the lack of data, the listing does not include Liberia. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) includes Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Côte d'Ivoire, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.
12. World Bank, World Development Indicators 2006;
13. UNDP, World Human Development Report 2006. According to one estimate, between 1750 and 1996 Africa's population increased from 95 million to 732 million people. By 2016, the UNDP estimates that the population of sub-Saharan Africa alone will increase by more than another 200 million. On urbanization,
14. see J. R. McNeill, Something new under the sun: an environmental history of the twentieth-century world (New York : Norton, 2001). In 1890 approximately 5% of Africans lived in urban areas ; by 1990 the figure was 34%. The number of mega-cities on the continent has also mushroomed : in 2000 there were 36 cities with populations of between 1 million and 10 million people, and two (Cairo and Lagos) with populations of over 10 million.
15. Patrick Chabal and Jean-Pascal Daloz, Africa works: disorder as a political instrument (Oxford: James Currey, 1999);
16. J.-F. Bayart, S. Ellis and B. Hibou, La Criminalisation de l'état en Afrique (Brussels: Complexe, 1997);
17. Jean-François Bayart, 'Le crime transnational et la formation de l'état', Politique Africaine, no. 93, March 2004; United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Crime and development in Africa (New York : UNODC, June 2005).
18. Emmanuel Kwesi Aning, 'The development of African criminal networks : the Ghana case', speech delivered at the African Criminal Networks Conference (ACNC), Bangkok, 16-19 May 2006. According to Kwesi Aning, the lack of respect for formal legal systems can also be interpreted as part of the historical rejection by Africans of practices and rules imposed on them during the colonial regime.
19. A more secure world: our shared responsibility, report of the High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Changes (New York: UN, 2004). The panel identified six security challenges: war between states; violence within states, including civil wars, large-scale human rights abuses and genocide; poverty, infectious disease and environmental degradation; nuclear, radiological, chemical and biological weapons; terrorism; and transnational organized crime.
20. In this context recourse to violence is the only available means to participants in criminal ventures to ensure their claims are respected.
21. UNODC, World Drug Report 2006 (New York, 2007). According to the UNODC, the overall turnover of the illicit drug industry worldwide can be estimated at some $300 billion annually.
22. In order to diminish this significant gap the UNODC is currently implementing an Africa-wide programme named 'DATA for Africa'. Its objective is to assist African countries in better monitoring, understanding and thereby tackling the drugs and crime nexus and its links with socio-economic development. Data are collected through individual African states' responses to the official UN questionnaires on drugs and crime and through the implementation of crime victim surveys.
23. The UNODC's mandate derives directly from the three UN Anti-Narcotic Conventions (and related protocols) of 1961,1971 and 1988; the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime of 2000, and its three protocols addressing trafficking in persons, smuggling of migrants and illicit manufacturing of and trafficking in firearms ; the UN Convention against Corruption of 2003 ; and the 13 international instruments on combating terrorism. In West Africa the UNODC operates through its regional office for West and Central Africa in Dakar, Senegal, and the country office for Nigeria in Abuja.
24. US Department of State, International Narcotics Control Reports 2004 and 2005 (Washington DC, 2004, 2005).
25. UNODC Regional Office for West Africa, 'Cocaine trafficking in western Africa', unpublished report, July 2007.
26. UNODC Regional Office for West Africa, 'Cocaine trafficking in western Africa'.
27. 'Venezuela, Panama seize cocaine shipments', World Security Network, 15 June 2007, http://www.world-securitynetwork.com/showArticle3.cfm?article_id= 14520&topicID=72, accessed 20 Sept. 2007;
28. 'Hallan 800 kilos de cocaína tras el amerizaje forzoso de un hidroavión', ABC España, 21 June 2007, http://www.abc.es/ hemeroteca/historico-21-06-2007/abc/Nacional/hallan-800-kilos-de-cocaina-tras- el-amerizaje-forzosode-un-hidroavion_1633827367526.html, accessed 20 Sept. 2007.
29. Most of these operators are Latin American, from Colombia, Venezuela, Mexico and Brazil, working in association with Spanish (Galician), Italian (Calabrian and Sicilian), French and Lebanese nationals. Very recently, large seizures conducted in Mauritania and Spain indicate a growing role by Moroccan drug-trafficking networks. According to the US Drug Enforcement Agency, Latin American drug cartels have set up branches in Nigeria, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea and Ghana. See Drug cartels begin cracking West Africa, Jane's Foreign Report (London : Jane's Information Group, 23 Aug. 2007).
30. On containers, see 'PJ apreende 500 quilos de cocaína no Porto da Praia', A Semana, 17 March 2007, http://www.liberdadi.com/17-03-07-pj- apreende-500-quilos-de-cocaina-no-porto-da-praia, accessed 13 Aug. 2007;
31. on ships, see Lu policía encuentra 7,5 toneladas de cocaína en un barco retenido en Vilagarcía de Arousa, Elmundo es-efe, 14 Oct. 2003, http://www.ehnundo.es/elmundo/2003/10/13/sociedad/ 1066031653.html, accessed 20 Sept. 2007;
32. on private yachts, see 'Plus de 3 tonnes de cocaïne saisies grâce à la coopération franco-espagnole', AFP, 2 Sept. 2005, http://www.emarrakech.info/Plus-de-3-tonnes-de-cocaine-saisies-grace-a-la- cooperationfranco-espagnole_a9469.html, accessed 20 Sept. 2007; on private planes, see 'Diez detenidos tras interceptarse en Segovia un avión con 100 kilos de cocaína', El País, 5 Dec. 2005.
33. UNODC Regional Office for West Africa, 'Cocaine trafficking in western Africa'. In February 2007 Interpol launched an alert following the arrest by the Dutch airport authorities in December 2006 of 32 passengers carrying cocaine. All passengers were on the same plane coming from Guinea-Conakry, transiting through Casablanca and bound for Amsterdam. Twenty-eight of the passengers arrested were Nigerians. In January 2007 the Moroccan authorities arrested 16 Nigerians in Casablanca for cocaine trafficking. They were in transit from Conakry and Bamako and were going to Spain. Between mid-April and the end of May 2007 French authorities at Orly airport in France seized 60kg of cocaine in ten cases on flights coming from Dakar, Senegal. A total of 13 people were arrested, each carrying on average about 4.5kg of cocaine.
34. US Department of State, International Narcotics Control Report 2006 (Washington DC, 2006), http://www.state. gov/p/inl/rls/nrcrpt/2006/, accessed 14 Aug. 2007. In November 2005, following the seizure of 62kg of heroin on an air shipment from Ghana, US immigration and customs enforcement officers arrested Eric Amoateng, a member of Ghana's parliament. On heroin trafficking from Ghana to the United States,
35. see also US Department of State, International Narcotics Control Report 2007, http://www.state.gov/p/inl/rls/nrcrpt/2007/, accessed 14 Aug. 2007.
36. For Senegal, see US Department of State, International Narcotics Control Report 2007. In March 2006 customs authorities seized a shipment of some 8 tonnes of hashish in a container from Pakistan that was destined for Europe.
37. For Niger, see Political drift and rebellion in Niger, Jane's Foreign Report (London : Jane's Information Group, 7 June 2007). In 2006 and 2007 Nigerian authorities patrolling the northern part of the country made five seizures of hashish totalling some 5.7 tonnes. Drug traffickers were using large and well-armed convoys of four-wheel-drive vehicles. Following the accusation by the government of Niger of having initiated the rebellion only to cover up the hashish trade, on 13 June 2007 the leader of the Touareg rebel movement Mouvement des Nigériens pour la Justice (MNJ), Aghali Alambo, announced the seizure of an important shipment of narcotics transiting the territory patrolled by MNJ Niger (' Situation dans le nord : Le MNJ arrête des trafiquants de drogue', L'Evénement, no. 196, 4 June 2007, http://www.temoust.org/spip.php?article23150, accessed 16 Aug. 2007). On 3 August 2007 President Moamadou Tandja called for an international conference on the issue of drug and small arms trafficking ('Tandja pour une conférence internationale sur la drogue et les armes', Panapress, 3 Aug. 2007).
38. US Department of State, International Narcotics Control Report. 2006. The following prices have been recorded by the Narcotic Control Board of Ghana for 2005: cocaine, 1g $18.50, dose $1.32; crack cocaine, dose $0.55; heroin, 1g $16, dose $1.10; cannabis, 1 cigarette $0.11.
39. UNODC, Trafficking in persons: global patterns (New York, 2007);
40. Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000: Trafficking in Persons Report 2007 (Washington DC : Department of State, 12 June 2007).
41. Child trafficking in West and Central Africa (UNICEF, West and Central Africa Regional Office, Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire, 2001)
42. 'Summary of findings from the child labor surveys in the cocoa sector of West Africa: Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana, and Nigeria' (Ibadan, Nigeria: International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, July 2002), http://www.dol.gov/ilat/media/reports/iclp/cocoafiudings.pdf, accessed 21 Sept. 2007.
43. Anti-Slavery International, The trafficking of children between Benin and Gabon: report summary (London, 1999). This gender imbalance has been attributed to the fact that in families that can afford to educate only one child, it is the male child who will be sent to school while the female child is placed in a family to work.
44. 'Au royame de l'''informerl'", Jeune Afrique, no. 230, 13-19 Feb. 2005.
45. Gambia . . . the smiling coast: a study on child sex tourism in The Gambia and the involvement of Dutch tourists (The Netherlands: Child Protection Alliance, The Gambia, and Terre des Hommes, The Netherlands, Jan. 2003). West African countries are increasingly becoming destinations for sexual tourism, particularly in its most heinous form, paedophilia.
46. "Trafficking in human beings, especially women and children, in Africa', Innocenti Research, innins04/15 (UNICEF: Florence, 2004);
47. UNODC, Trafficking in persons: global patterns (New York, 2006).
48. UNODC, Trafficking in persons: global patterns. A 2002 study published jointly by the ILO and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture found that an estimated 284,000 children on cocoa farms in West Africa were 'either involved in hazardous work, unprotected or un-free, or have been trafficked'. Most of the children were on cocoa farms in Côte d'Ivoire, the world's largest cocoa producer. The remaining children laboured on farms in Ghana, Cameroon and Nigeria.
49. See Abimbola Lagunju and Moussa Diop, Les Enfants talibés mendiants Bissau-Guinéens: leur vie, leur drame (Dakar: Terre des Hommes/Enda Graf, 15 Dec. 2006).
50. G. Germano, Italian ambassador to Nigeria, speech to 'Pan-African conference against trafficking in persons', Abuja, Nigeria, Feb. 2000. Nigerian and Italian authorities estimate that there are 10,000-15,000 Nigerian prostitutes in Italy. See also United Nations International Crime Research Unit, Programme of action against trafficking in minors and young women from Nigeria into Italy for the purpose of sexual exploitation, final report, Oct. 2003-April 2004, Turin UNICRI 559/A/N.
51. Kathleen Fitzgibbon, 'Modern day slavery? The scope of trafficking in persons in Africa', African Security Review 12/1, 2003, http://www.co.za/Pubs/ASR/12No1/EFitz.html, accessed 20 Sept. 2007.
52. UNICRI, Programme of action against trafficking in minors;
53. see also 'Bonoua : 32 enfants victimes de trafic interceptés', Fraternité Matin, Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire, 13 Aug. 2007.
54. Fitzgibbon, 'Modern day slavery?'
55. International Organization for Migration (IOM), Geneva, Assessment of trafficking in persons in Nigeria, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria, Nov. 2001. These trafficking networks, dominated by Nigerian organized crime, are highly adaptive and have expanded their operations into Benin, Togo, Ghana, Guinea, Mali and South Africa.
56. See also UNICRI, Programme of action against trafficking in minors.
57. Fitzgibbon, 'Modern day slavery?'. The madam then forces the victim into prostitution to repay a debt of up to $50,000. Traffickers of women taken to Europe for commercial sexual exploitation typically earn $20,000-50,000 per victim.
58. 'Official: 300 African migrants drown a month', Associated Press, 31 May 2006. The Spanish minister of the interior told radio Cadena Sur that 'while hundreds of Africans have died in the past few months trying to make the trip, three or four boats reach the island every day. So far this year, more than 2,000 immigrants have made it to the islands.'
59. 'Senegal: government working with Spain on child migrants', International Regional Information Network, UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Geneva, 26 July 2007, http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId= 73447, accessed 14 Aug. 2007. According to the authorities of the Canary Islands, 31,863 irregular migrants arrived on the islands in 2006, up from 4,790 in 2005. According to Manuel López Baumann, research and information officer in the IOM's West and Central Africa office, some 7,000 people are estimated to have died trying to reach the Canary Islands in 2006.
60. 'Senegal: government working with Spain on child migrants'. According to a Human Rights Watch report issued on 26 July 2007, 'Unwelcome responsibilities : Spain's failure to protect the rights of unaccompanied migrant children in the Canary Islands', 931 migrant boys arrived on the Canary Islands after dangerous journeys in makeshift boats in 2006.
61. Joint International Center for Migration Policy Development-Europol Mediterranean Transit Migration meeting on 'Migration flows and trends in the Mediterranean: threat assessments and risk analysis', 25-29 April 2006, Beirut.
62. UNODC, Organized crime and irregular migration from Africa to Europe (New York, July 2006). Smuggling of Asian illegal migrants through West and Central Africa is managed directly by Asian networks relying on pre-existent legitimate commercial businesses along the smuggling route for the provision of the necessary local logistic assistance. In this context illegal migrants are often made to provide free labour to smugglers' commercial activities as partial payment in kind for the trip.
63. UNODC, Organized crime and irregular migration from Africa to Europe. In South Africa, 79 Nigerian nationals were arrested in connection with running a child prostitution ring in 2005.
64. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report 2005 (Washington DC, 2005).
65. 'Ghana: 500 euros pour rejoindre Gaoou Agadez', Serge Daniel for Radio France Internationale, 27 April 2006, http://www.rfi.fr/actufr/articles/076/ article_43343.asp, accessed 20 Sept. 2007.
66. Interpol, 'Specialized meeting on illegal migration from Africa towards Europe', 20-23 May 2006, Casablanca.
67. 'Una red Senegalese indroduce en Italia à mas de mil inmigrantes llegados a Canarias', El País, 24 Oct. 2006.
68. UNODC, Organized crime and irregular migration from Africa to Europe.
69. EUROPOL/Interpol, 'Assessment on people smuggling in the eastern Mediterranean', 2005. For more detailed information, please see http://www.interpol.int/Public/FinancialCrime/MoneyLaundering/hawala, accessed 20 Sept. 2007.
70. Moroccan delegation at the Joint ICMPD-Europol MTM meeting on 'Migrations flows and trends in the Mediterranean'. Extortion of this sort has also been reported among Bangladeshi migrants. See also H. Vogt, 'Smuggled migrants struggle in African town', Associated Press, 29 April 2006.
71. UNODC, Organized crime and irregular migration from Africa to Europe.
72. The gravity of the situation is particularly evident in Nigeria, where in 2003 organized criminal networks controlling the parallel market of substandard and fake medical preparations attempted to take the life of the director of the Nigerian Agency for Food and Drug Control, Prof. Dora Nkem Akunyili. See also 'Counterfeiting medicines : a serious crime against humanity', presentation by Prof. Dora Akunyili to the European Parliament, Brussels, 10 April 2007, http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:4JgIlBPsIoAJ:www.europarl.europa.eu/ comparl/deve/hearings/20070410/akunyili1.pdf+crime+west+africa&hl=en&ct= cluk&cd=65, accessed 13 Aug. 2007.
73. Counterfeiting and organised crime (Paris: Union des Fabricants, 2003), http://www.interpol.int/Public/FinancialCrime/IntellectualProperty/ Publications/UDFCounterfeiting.pdf, accessed 20 Sept. 2007.
74. 'Pirate gold: music counterfeiting in Italy', Jane's Intelligence Review, 1 June 2007. In this context it is worth noting that Naples and Campania host large communities of West Africans, particularly Nigerians.
75. There is an agreed definition of 'illegal oil bunkering', a neologism probably coined in Nigeria to describe a feature of its oil industry. 'Bunkering' is an industry term that describes the process of filling a ship with oil (or coal). 'Illegal oil bunkering' means the stealing (and subsequent selling on the open market) of crude oil and its derivatives either by drilling pipelines, or by clandestinely bunkering large quantities of crude oil by the use of forged documents. Illegal bunkering by drilling pipelines is mostly carried out by local people. In addition to the environmental damage caused by oil spillage, it often results in fatal accidents. In this context, it is a crime committed by the poor, feeding poor markets, the price of which in frequent fatalities is paid for by the poor. On the other hand, the large capital investments required for illegal bunkering by the use of bunkers suggests the existence of articulate and powerful networks composed of both national and foreign operations able to load, transport and sell the stolen crude oil. This is why illegal oil bunkering appears in the list of economic crimes of competence of the Nigerian Economic and Financial Crime Commission.
76. See in particular 'Final report of the Panel of Experts on the Illegal Exploitation of Natural Resources and Other Forms of Wealth of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the Security Council', S/2002/1146, 16 Oct. 2002, UN New York. See also reports by, among others, Global Witness, the International Crisis Group, the Open Society Institute and Small Arms Survey.
77. 'For a few dollars more: how al Qaeda moved into the diamond trade', Global Witness, April 2003, www. globalwitness.org, accessed 20 Sept. 2007.
78. 'The usual suspects: Liberia's weapons and mercenaries in Côte d'Ivoire and Sierra Leone', Global Witness, March 2003, www.globalwitness.org, accessed 20 Sept. 2007.
79. The 7% estimate comes from 'Reforming the nearly unreformable', The Economist, 5 Aug. 2004; the 10% estimate from 'Peace and security in the Niger Delta: Conflict Expert Group baseline report', working paper for Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria, Dec. 2003.
80. 'Disarray among Nigeria's armed militants', Jane's Intelligence Digest, 10 Aug. 2007.
81. 'Chinese involvement in African illegal logging and timber trade', testimony of Allan Thornton, President, Environmental Investigation Agency, before the US House of Representatives Committee on International Relations, Subcommittee on Africa, Global Human Rights and International Operations, 28 July 2005, www.internationalrelations.house.gov/archives/109/22658.pdf, accessed 19 Sept. 2007.
82. According to the WWF, countries topping the list of victims of illegal logging are Liberia, Gabon, Ghana, Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea: see http://www.panda.org/about_wwf/where_we_work/afrlca/problems/logging/index.cfm, accessed 19 Sept. 2007.
83. 'Facing up to illegal logging', The Economist, 25-31 March 2006, quoting a World Bank study.
84. 'Combating illegal logging in Africa : declaration strengthens law enforcement and sustainable forests management' (Washington DC: World Bank, 13 Nov. 2003).
85. Murl Baker, Robert Clausen, Ramzy Kanaan, Michel N'Goma, Trifin Roule, Janice Thomson, 'Conflict timber: dimensions of the problem in Asia and Africa', Volume III, African Cases, final report by ARD, Inc., Vermont, submitted to US Agency for International Development, http://www.usaid.gov/our_work/ crosscutting_programs/transition_initiatives/pubs/vol3afr.pdf, accessed 21 Sept. 2007.
86. 'Profile: Liberia's "Mister Gus'", BBC News, 7 June 2006, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/5055442.stm, accessed 16 Aug. 2007. The Dutch court sentenced Mr Gus Kouwenhoven to eight years in prison for violating a UN arms embargo. He was, however, acquitted of war crimes charges.
87. 'Armed and aimless: armed groups, guns, and human security in the ECOWAS region', Small Arms Survey, May 2005, www.smallarmssurvey.org, accessed 20 Sept. 2007;
88. also Alex Vines, Light weapons proliferation in West Africa, paper presented at UNODC seminar, Dakar, 3 April 2004, repr. in UNODC, Transnational organized crime in the West African region (New York, 2005).
89. 'Delegation concludessensitization mission for the ratification of Small Anns Convention'.ECOWASpress release no. 70/2007, Abuja, 23 July 2007, http://news.ecowas.int/en/presseshow.php?nb=70&lang=en&annee=2007, accessed 16 Aug. 2007. The Declaration of a Moratorium on the Importation, Exportation and Manufacture of Small Arms and Light Weapons in West Africa was adopted and signed in Abuja on 31 Oct. 1998 by the heads of state and government of the Economic Community of West African States. The moratorium was renewed on 9 July 2001 for a further three years. On 14 July 2006 the ECOWAS heads of state endorsed and signed the ECOWAS Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons, their Ammunition and Other Related Materials at their summit in Abuja. The convention replaces the moratorium. As of July 2007, only Niger had deposited the instrument of ratification.
90. Vines, Light weapons proliferation in West Africa. In Ghana, pioneering research on manufacturing capacity suggests a total potential production of some 40,000-60,000 guns annually by over 2,500 small workshops. Major destination markets for guns manufactured in Ghana seem to be Côte d'Ivoire, Togo and Nigeria.
91. Thomas Madnick, 'Arms trafficking in West Africa', University of Michigan Political Review, March 2005, pp. 21-5.
92. UNODC, Transnational organized crime in the West African region.
93. Stephen Ellis, paper presented to the African Criminal Network Conference, Bangkok, 16-19 May 2006.
94. Muazu Umar, of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, Lagos, Nigeria, paper presented to the African Criminal Network Conference, Bangkok, 16-19 May 2006.
95. Umar, paper presented to the African Criminal Network Conference, Bangkok, 16-19 May 2006; UNODC, Transnational organized crime in the West African region.
96. 'Report of the Secretary General on cross-border issues in West Africa', S/2007/143, 13 March 2007, p. 9. See also 'Progress report of the Secretary-General on ways to combat subregional and cross-border problems in West Africa', S/2005/86, 11 Feb. 2005, both at http://www.un.org/unowa/unowa/ scdocs/scdocs.htm, accessed 18 Aug. 2007.
97. UNODC, Crime and development in Africa (New York, June 2005).
98. This aspect is of particular relevance in drug and natural resource trafficking, where foreign criminal networks are ready to pay large sums of money to buy impunity and operational freedom.
99. Unofficial report made available to UNODC by the Bissau-Guinean authorities. The group was operating a fake fish-processing facility where a clandestine landing strip had been built. A large number of weapons were also seized, together with 19kg of cocaine.
100. Several articles have recently been published on Guinea-Bissau and drug trafficking. See 'Guinea-Bissau : fears of an emerging narco-state', IRIN, 2 Feb. 2007;
101. Vivianne Walt, 'Cocaine country', Time magazine, 27 June 2007;
102. 'Pushers' paradise', The Economist, 7 June 2007.
103. 'UNODC chief welcomes major cocaine seizure in Guinea-Bissau, urges full backing for police', UNIS/NAR/997, 4 April 2007.
104. Kissy Agyeman, 'Narcotics trade in Guinea-Bissau a growing problem as former ministers questioned', Global Insight Daily Analysis, 7 June 2007. Two former ministers in Guinea-Bissau, former Treasury Minister Jose Dju and former Finance Minister Victor Mandinga, were brought before a government anti-drug commission regarding their supposed involvement in the disappearance of the seized narcotic.
105. UNODC, World Drug Report 2006 (New York, 2007).
106. UNDP, Human Development Index 2006.
107. 'Italy police arrest Mafia suspect', BBC News, 14 Nov. 2003, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3270935. stm, accessed 19 Sept. 2007. Giovanni Bonomo was sought for murder and associating with the Mafia, and had been on the run for seven years. Police say he has been involved in money-laundering activities for the Mafia in Namibia and South Africa.
108. 'Ghana MP in US "heroin" arrest', BBC News, 22 Nov. 2005.
109. http://www.aujourdhui.ma/societe-details55846.html, accessed 17 Aug. 2007.
110. 'Golden age of cocainecracy', www.ghanaweb.com. accessed 15 Aug. 2007.
111. US Department of State, International Narcotics Control Reports 2006 (Washington DC: Department of State, 2006).
112. Jeffrey Herbst, 'Economic incentives, natural resources and conflict in Africa', Journal of African Economies, 9:3 October 2000, pp. 270-94;
113. Adekeye Adebajo and Ismail Rashid, eds, West Africa security challenges:building peace in a troubled region (Boulder, CO : Lynne Rienner, 2004).
114. UNODC, 'Assessment of the integrity and capacity of the justice system in three Nigerian states', Jan. 2006, http://www.unodc.org/pdf/corruption/ publications_nigeria_assessment.pdf, accessed 20 Sept. 2007. The report follows the implementation of a project signed in 2001 that aimed at strengthening the rule of law, through increased capacity and integrity of the justice system, in particular of the judiciary.
115. Unfortunately, however, in these programmes the needs of the civilian security and justice sectors come second to those of the military apparatus (under plans for disarmament and demobilization).
116. Legislation to counter money-laundering, albeit not always conforming to international standards, is in place in Benin, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal and Sierra Leone.
117. The Interministerial Action Group Against Money Laundering - GIABA, according to its French acronym, was established by ECOWAS in 2000. As UEMOA member states are concerned (Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Niger, Senegal, Togo), the process of legislating to counter money-laundering has been facilitated by the promulgation of a common UEMAO model law, Règlement no. 14/2002/UEMOA, in 2002.
118. https://www.uuodc.org/art/docs/euglish_prog_action.pdf, accessed 20 Sept. 2007.
119. 'West Africa draws up plan to fight drug smuggling', Reuters, n Sept. 2007. In July 2007, as an immediate reaction to the deterioration of the drug-trafficking situation in the region, the heads of state of ECOWAS mandated the GIABA secretariat with the preparation of an emergency action plan, which is due to be launched before the end of 2007.
120. The draft AU Plan of Action on Drug Control and Crime Prevention (2007-10) elaborated by the African Union Commission includes most of the priorities contained in the 2005 UNODC programme for action. The draft AU plan is expected to be adopted by the AU ministerial conference to be held in November 2007, in Libya, and launched immediately afterwards.
121. Carlo Maria Verardi, 'Democrazia, giustizia e libertà', speech delivered at the 20th Magistratura Democratica National Congress, Bologna, April 1998.