TRAP Act Reports Ignore State Department's Interpol Abuse Reports

Conflicting Accounts on Interpol Abuse: Comparing US Government Reports, with Sandra Grossman, Red Notice Monitor, September 29, 2023. "Many of those organizations and individuals who championed the TRAP Act, in the hope that it would compel the U.S. government to lead the fight for the reform of Interpol as well as promote deeper understanding of Interpol abuse, have been sorely disappointed by the initial TRAP reports. In short, the DoJ-DoS TRAP reports contain numerous contradictions and misstatements of fact, and are incompatible with the better, if not complete, reporting on Interpol abuse published by the State Department in its Country Reports. There is room for significant improvement in the first two TRAP reports. The author also hopes that these reports are not representative of DoS and DoJ’s support for Interpol reforms."

NDAA 2024 - Treaties, Interpol, and Taiwain

NDAA 2024: Increasing the Readiness of the U.S. Military, edited by Maiya Clark, Heritage Foundation Special Report #269, March 22, 2023,sections 64-66. "Congress should condemn the Attorney General and the Secretary of State for refusing to publish a substantive report in compliance with Section 6503 of the FY 2022 NDAA. It should reiterate its request for such a report, this time requiring that the report draw on all available public evidence, including that already published by the State Department, and state that it will respond with hearings to any failure to produce a substantive report."

Neutrality Is Not Blindness

Interpol Is Doing Russia’s Dirty Work, with barrister Ben Keith, Politico, January 24, 2023. "Interpol’s member countries pledge to work together to prevent genuine criminals from escaping justice, and the system is based on the presumption that all its members are acting in good faith. But like other authoritarian members of Interpol, Russia abuses that presumption to pursue enemies of Putin’s regime. That has to stop, and Interpol has all the tools it needs to do so — including suspending Russia from the organization."

More Silliness, and Worse, from Interpol

Another Year Brings More Autocratic Victories Over the Democratic Members of Interpol, Daily Signal, November 4, 2022. "The most recent annual meeting of Interpol’s governing body brought more bad news for its democratic member states, including the U.S."

Interpol Elections and Interpol Abusers

US Leadership Needed to Push Back on China’s Abuse of Interpol, Daily Signal, August 31, 2022. "But Interpol does have problems. And China is among the biggest. The next meeting of the Interpol General Assembly, which makes the final decisions for the organization, is set to take place in India from Oct. 18 to 21. The General Assembly’s last meeting, in 2021, was a disaster for the U.S. Representatives from authoritarian regimes, including China, took control of the Executive Committee, which supervises implementation of the General Assembly’s decisions."

Interpol's Finances

Interpol Needs Improved Financial Transparency to Restore Its Integrity and Block Autocratic Manipulation, Heritage Foundation Special Report #258, August 1, 2022. "Interpol serves a valuable purpose and deserves to be properly funded. Its democratic member nations have a particular stake in ensuring thatInterpol can fund itself through its normal budgetary processes, for the less Interpol relies on statutory contributions, the more likely it is to fall into the financial clutches of the autocracies that seek to abuse it for their own ends. The U.S. and its democratic allies in Interpol need to start laying the groundwork now for the election of the organization’s next Secretary General in 2024. No reforms of Interpol’s finances or of Interpol more broadly, no matter how necessary or far-reaching, will be effective if Interpol’s leaders are not committed to upholding and advancing them."

Interpol Should Have Suspended Russia

Russia Wrongly Escapes Suspension From Interpol, Daily Signal, March 17, 2022. "For years, Russia has been one of the worst abusers of Interpol. It uses the international police organization to harass political opponents and to brand as criminals any business leaders who own property the Kremlin wants to steal."

Land Mines, Clusters, ATT, and Interpol in FY2023 NDAA

How the National Defense Authorization (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2023 Should Prepare the Military for Great-Power Competition, edited by Frederico Bartels, Heritage Foundation Special Report #257, March 10, 2022, see recommendations 59 and 60.

Assessing FY2022 NDAA TRAP Provisions

Fiscal Year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act Contains Transnational Repression Accountability and Prevention Provision on Interpol Abuse, with Uttam Dhillon, International Enforcement Law Reporter, February 25, 2022. "On December 27, 2021, President Joe Biden signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) into law. The NDAA contains Sec. 6503, “Transnational Repression Accountability and Prevention,” (TRAP) which incorporates, with substantial alterations, provisions from the TRAP Acts introduced on a bipartisan basis in both the Senate and the House in 2019 and 2021."

The Latest Interpol GA Fiasco

Interpol’s New Leadership Demonstrates Lack of Will for Reform, with Sandra Grossman, National Interest, December 17, 2021. "Interpol makes valuable contributions to fighting crime that crosses international borders, but human rights organizations have rightly criticized the organization for failing to properly vet requests for police cooperation. Interpol did nothing to calm those concerns at its latest General Assembly meeting, held November 23-25 in Istanbul."

My NDAA Priorities for FY2022

Improving the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022, edited by Frederico Bartels, Heritage Foundation Backgrounder #3673, December 3, 3021. "The Armed Forces are in the midst a substantial change in how they execute deterrence and prepare for war. The effort to refocus the Department of Defense on great-power competition started in earnest with the 2018 National Defense Strategy. This refocus is not a discreet event but an ongoing process that will take time and resources. The challenges to increase the size of the Navy are representative of the necessary time horizon for the other branches of the military. In this endeavor, Congress is an equal partner with the executive branch, and the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) represents a critically important opportunity to strengthen the national defense."

UAE Wins Interpol Presidency

In Interpol Elections, the Autocracies Take Control, Daily Signal, November 29, 2021. "The General Assembly last week held its latest round of elections, and the results were just about as bad as they could have been."

The FY2022 NDAA and Interpol

Abuse of Interpol for Transnational Repression: Assessing the FY22 NDAA’s Provisions for Prevention, with Jonathan Reich, Just Security, November 10, 2021. "The U.S. Congress has expressed increasing concern in recent years about the rise in transnational repression — that is, cross-border actions ranging from assassinations and abductions to intimidation and financial blacklisting that seek to deter and punish opposition or dissent. One form of transnational repression that has attracted considerable attention is the abuse by certain member countries of Interpol, the international organization tasked with facilitating worldwide police cooperation. As the single-largest funder of Interpol, the United States has an opportunity to take significant steps to curtail transnational repression by opposing Interpol abuse. This would both help to ensure that Interpol serves its intended purpose, and aid in setting the agenda for wider liberal democratic opposition to transnational repression in all its forms."

Interpol Priorities in 2021

Key Priorities for the U.S. at the 2021 Meeting of the Interpol General Assembly, Heritage Foundation Backgrounder #3664, November 1, 2021. "The 89th annual meeting of the Interpol General Assembly to be held this November 23–25 in Istanbul, Turkey, will be dominated by the election of a majority of Interpol’s Executive Committee, including a new president of Interpol, and the election of all seven members of Interpol’s appellate body, the Commission for the Control of Interpol’s Files. The United States should work with other democratic nations to form a democratic caucus in Interpol to ensure that qualified candidates from law-abiding democracies fill these positions. While the agenda for Interpol reform is wide, the United States should recognize that the autocracies are bidding in particular to win Interpol’s presidency, and defeating that bid—not reforming Interpol—will have to be the top priority in 2021."

How Interpol Abuse Affects the U.S. Legal System

Dictators Are Using Interpol to Shape America’s Legal System. It’s Time to Change That, with Heritage intern Zach Thapar, Daily Signal, August 17, 2021. "Without these reforms, authoritarian regimes will continue to define who is a criminal in the United States, and American law enforcement will continue to treat their meritless requests as legitimate. We must end this foreign manipulation of the American criminal justice system."

Interpol CCF Elections

America Must Lead Free World in Elections to Interpol Commission, Daily Signal, June 1, 2021. "Interpol, the international organization of police organizations, has an important election coming up. That election will determine the new membership of a body known as the Commission for the Control of Interpol’s Files. The commission’s job is to check that the processing of personal data by Interpol complies with the police organization’s own rules, and to decide on requests for access to data and for correction and/or deletion of data processed by Interpol."

Interpol Abuse ABCs

What Americans Should Know About Interpol Abuse, Daily Signal, May 17, 2021. "I have a lot of experience researching Interpol, and, though my work as an expert witness, I’ve seen a lot of Interpol abuse cases. Broadly speaking, I’d say the State Department’s list is a good start—Russia is certainly a notorious abuser—but far from complete."

Interpol's Revised RPD

Summarizing and Assessing the 2019 Changes in Interpol’s Rules on the Processing of Data, with Michelle Estlund, International Enforcement Law Reporter, volume 37, issue 4, April 2, 2021. "While Interpol has published the revised RPD, it has neither itemized the revisions nor provided a red-line version of the RPD. This article summarizes the 2019 revisions and assesses their significance, both for attorneys seeking the knowledge they need to effectively advocate for their clients when an Interpol issue arises and for practitioners concerned to ensure that Interpol is used only for purposes of legitimate law enforcement. Finally, it provides a practical illustration of the importance of Interpol’s rules on data protection for attorneys advocating before the Commission for the Control of Interpol’s Files (the “CCF”)."

Interpol Elections Require U.S. Leadership

The U.S. Must Promote Democratic Leadership in Interpol, Heritage Foundation Issue Brief #6025, November 10, 2020. "The next meeting of the Interpol General Assembly will likely be dominated by the election of a majority of Interpol’s Executive Committee, including a new president. The current public contenders for Interpol’s presidency hail from nations with a track record of abusing Interpol. The U.S. should work with other leading democracies to form a democratic caucus in Interpol to ensure that qualified candidates from law-abiding democracies fill these positions. While the agenda for Interpol reform is wide, the U.S.’s top priority must be ensuring that Interpol’s leadership is committed to opposing the autocratic abuse of Interpol."

The Interpol Presidency in 2020

The Top U.S. Priority at the 2020 Meeting of the Interpol General Assembly, Heritage Foundation Issue Brief #6005, August 26, 2020. "The 2020 annual meeting of the Interpol General Assembly, to be held in December in Abu Dhabi, will likely be dominated by the election of a majority of Interpol’s executive committee, including a new president. The United States should work with other democratic nations to form a democratic caucus within Interpol to ensure that qualified candidates from law-abiding democracies fill these positions. While the agenda for Interpol reform is wide, the U.S. must anticipate that the autocracies will make a bid in particular to win Interpol’s presidency, and defeating that bid—not reforming Interpol—will have to be the top U.S. priority in 2020."