A private group - above the law - and answerable to no-one!

To most of us, the name Interpol conjures up images of an International Police organisation working with James Bond type characters, using the most modern means to track down the world's worst criminals. However, those who delve into who and what Interpol really is, know just how fictitious that picture really is.

History of Interpol

"The list of presidents and executive members of Interpol reads like a Nazi 'Who's Who', during, as well as after the war. [And] if you then place a Nazi in charge of a fascist organisation like Interpol, the result of such a crossbreed is dreadful to contemplate." Hon. Lewis Kent, Member of Parliament

Efforts to establish a European central police force were made by the French police as early as 1904, when criminals were taking full advantage of the mobility offered by the new speed of rail travel. A crime might occur in France, and a short time later the criminal responsible could be safely across the border in Germany.

By 1914, the French efforts led to the First International Congress of Criminal Police, which was held in Monaco. All efforts at centralisation were interrupted by WW1, after which the balance of European power changed, and Vienna became the centre of much of Europe's co-operative police activity. In 1923, approximately 130 representatives from over 20 countries attended an International Police Congress, held in Vienna on September 3rd. It was at this congress that agreement was reached to create the forerunner International Criminal Police Commission, which had a cable designation of Interpol.

Since the Austrian police had convened the Congress, it was decided that the head of the Austrian police would automatically be the president of Interpol. Austria continued to dominate Interpol up until WWII, and provided most of the executive personnel, and virtually all of the funding. Prior to WWII, Interpol acted as a forum for information and ideas exchange, with co-operation among its member police forces being informal. It is doubtful that any had the authority to bind their governments to any arrangements they might make. But co-operation did occur, and as a former secretary general of Interpol, Andre Bossard stated in 1985, "For a long time we operated as a sort of 'professional club".

Domination by Nazis

At 8am on March 12th, 1938, Nazi Germany invaded Austria. By 12 noon on the same day, Heinrich Himmler had removed the President of Interpol, Dr Michael Skubl, and replaced him Otto Steinhausl. Steinhausl who had just been released from prison in Austria by Himmler, was now head of the Austrian Police and the new Interpol President. The cover of Interpol's publication, The International Criminal Police Review (July 10, 1040 issue) shows Steinhausl in his full uniform as a Gestapo Colonel. During the war, Interpol aided the Nazis to round up Jews and Gypsies, who were then sent to camps. Interpol's files were used extensively by the Nazis to maintain extensive dossiers on thousands of individuals. The heart of the Nazi system was secret dossiers. Interpol today is built around its secret dossiers. It maintains files on hundreds of thousands of private citizens from all over the world on its state of the art computers.

From 1940 through to his assassination in 1942, the president of Interpol was Reinhard Heydrich, known as "The Hangman". He was found responsible for some of the worst atrocities of WWII. Heydrich was followed by Ernst Kaltenbrunner, another Nazi fanatic who showed an inhuman pleasure in visiting death camps to view various methods of killing and torture. After the fall of the Nazi regime, Interpol's president, Kaltenbrunner, was hanged for war crimes in 1946. In late 1946, representatives from at least 16 nations gathered in Belgium for Interpol's first post-war meeting, in an attempt to reconstruct the organisation. Of the five officials who called the meeting, at least three had collaborated with the Nazis during the war.

According to researchers from the National Commission on Law Enforcement and Social Justice, the Interpol President from 1968-1972, Paul Dickopf, had been a member of the Nazi SS during the war. His personnel file contained his SS number (337259) and other documentation. When confronted with this in 1974, Interpol denied the story outright. In 1975 however, Interpol subsequently changed its story, claiming Dickopf's membership was involuntary. There was no such thing as involuntary membership of the SS, as historians will verify.

Structure of Interpol

Most of Interpol's work is done at the Interpol offices in member countries. These are known as National Central Bureau's (NCB's). As of early 1990, Interpolo consisted of the law enforcement agencies of over 150 nations. The 1988 US Department of Justice Manual describes Interlope in the following manner:

"Interlope is something of a legal curiosity. It conducts inter-governmental activities, but it is not based on an international treaty, convention, or similar legal instrument. It is founded on a constitution written by a group of police officers who did not submit it for diplomatic signatures, nor have they ever submitted it for ratification by governments."

1. The General Secretariat

The central offices in Lyon, France, are referred to as the General Secretariat. This is the headquarters of Interlope. it contains over 250 permanent staff, including approx. 90 police officers from 36 countries. The General Secretariat is administered by the Secretary General. He is chosen by the General Assembly, and serves a five year term. The General Secretariat is composed of four divisions as follows:

• General Administration. Deals with finances, personnel, supplies, logistics, security etc
• Police Division. Deals in i) General offences ii) economic and financial crimes; iii) illicit drug trafficking
• Legal, Technical and Reference Sections
  
• Telecommunications, files, and data processing.

2. The General Assembly

According to Article 6 of Interpol's Constitution, the General Assembly is the "supreme authority" of Interpol. It is composed of representatives of the member police forces who meet each year to approve new admissions, policy and budgets etc.

3. The Executive Committee

Elected by the General Assembly, the Executive Committee consists of 13 members: 1 President, 4 Vice-Presidents, and 8 delegates. it is derive exclusively from delegates to the General Assembly.

4. National Central Bureau

The Interpol "office" in each member country is called a National Central Bureau (NCB). Each NCB is allocated space, supplies, and personnel to serve as a liaison point for Interpol communications and requests in that country.

Finances

Interpol's resources are provided by "(a) the financial contributions from Members; and (b) gifts, bequests, subsidies, grants and other resources after these have been accepted or approved by the Executive Committee" according to Article 38 of Interpol's Constitution. Each year an external accounting firm audits Interpol. This report goes to the President and Secretary General, and is not made public. The group answers to no one other than itself. In February 1984, Interpol made an agreement with the French Government, which became known as the "Interpol Headquarters Agreement" or "seat agreement". The agreement grants complete immunity under French law from all legal liability for itself and its officers. It also 'shields' its files from any requirement of disclosure. This agreement became necessary because of the growing number of civil lawsuits against Interpol.

Interpol involvement with drug trafficking

"[Panamanian Interpol Chief] Nivaldo Madrinan was receiving telexes in his Interpol office in Panama from Interpol Columbia which showed him the exact drug trafficking routes. Madrinan would then get a kickback from the traffickers, and allow the drugs to pass" Lt. Colonel Carlos Worrel Panamanian Military Forces, Miami, Florida

Interpol which is supposed to be helping stop the world's illicit drug trade, is apparently failing dramatically. There are even many allegations that Interpol is aiding and abetting the large drug syndicates, and are only 'busting' the small operators. According to Interpol's own propaganda, the control of the drug trade is the organisation's top priority. Maybe that was an unfortunate choice of words, as despite its extensive resources, Interpol has not made any significant headway in reducing the drug trade, nor has it made any significant arrests. Instead, Interpol's effectiveness in handling drug information has led to suspicions of Interpol's direct involvement with the drug trade.

o Four Bolivian Interpol chiefs have been involved with drug trafficking, or linked to drug traffickers. An Ecuadorian Interpol head is known to have provided favours to local drug traffickers. o The Peruvian Interpol chief from 1981 to 1988 was convicted and sentenced to 15 years in prison for drug trafficking. o An Interpol chief in Panama was tied to the Medellin drug cartel and was also directly involved with drug trafficking on a massive scale. he is now being held in Panama by US troops, charged with murder. o Two Mexican Interpol Chiefs have been accused of running the drug trade in their country. One of these Mexican Interpol chiefs killed his wife, another woman and then himself; the other was recently charged with involvement in the murder of a DEA agent. o The former ruler of Panama and the former ruler of Pakistan, both having records of involvement in the world's drug trade, inexplicably received Interpol awards for international effectiveness in combating drug trafficking.

Interpol and politics

In 1950 the United States withdrew from Interpol after discovering that Czech officials used the Interpol network to hunt down of 10 political refugees who had fled to West Germany for political reasons. Interpol has an increasingly bad record for involvement in acting as pseudo political police. Under Fernando Paredes Pizarro, the Chilean Secret Police have become infamous for their human rights abuses, including raids on the Catholic Church, and widespread torture, abductions, and jailings. Pizarro, not only heads the Interpol office in Chile, but has also been on the Executive Committee of Interpol since 1987.

Interpol intervened to prevent the extradition of Klaus Barbie from Bolivia and the extradition of Josef Mengele from Paraguay.

No control over local branches.

In many other incidents, too numerous to mention here, Interpol has clearly acted in violation of Article 3 of its own constitution, which forbids its involvement in political, religious, military or racial affairs. William Walsh, a Washington DC attorney concerned about Interpol's frequent violations of privacy and human rights, made public a letter he wrote in February 1989 to Interpol Secretary General Raymond Kendall.

Kendall's response of January 1989 states:

"Recently, the ICPO-Interpol has been accused of intervening in cases of a religious nature, contrary to Article 3 of the organisation's constitution..."

"The National Central Bureau (NCB) in each Interpol member country is not part of the legal entity known as ICPO-Interpol. An NCB is a body designated by the appropriate authorities in each member country as its correspondent with the ICPO-Interpol and the other NCB's."

"...Only the member country concerned is responsible for the actions of the NCB, not the organisation"

While not taking responsibility for the actions of its NCBs, Interpol has shown it wants full control over all personnel assigned to its headquarters, who are expected to give up their allegiance to their individual countries for the term assigned to Interpol.

Calls for investigation of Interpol

On July 4th 1989, 13 members of the Council of Europe issued a motion calling for an extensive investigation of Interpol. Some extracts from this motion include:

• "Interpol "operates internationally with no governmental oversight from any of its member organisations".
• "Interpol provides dossiers, on request, via computer interlink, to police organisation in member countries around the world, amongst which are Iran and Libya who have shown to be involved in international terrorism"
• Interpol organised as a private organisation by police officers, never submitted its constitution for ratification by any government, has located its headquarters in France where it has been granted immunity from the legal process by the Government of the French Republic thereby placing the organisation above the laws of any land, not being legally accountable for its acts."
• "Individuals and organisations have unable to rectify the files on them that Interpol, while having conclusively proven they were false, has sent uncontrolled across borders, secretly showing them to judges, leading in several cases to wrong imprisonment of the civilians involved";
• "Interpol insists that its highest priority is stopping the flow of international drug trafficking, while in recent years, Interpol officials have been reported as being involved in drug trafficking in several South American countries and possibly others."

The motion then calls for the following:

a. The status of Interpol with the Council of Europe should be reviewed

b. An inventory of transgressions committed by Interpol should be drawn up;

c. Effective ways to control the International Criminal Police Organisation, Interpol, in a democratic fashion should be considered ...so Interpol hereafter will be accountable for its acts; d. Strict measures should be elaborated and recommended to ensure that a refusal by Interpol to reveal and rectify files on request by an individual or organisation is scrutinised by an independent, democratically chosen committee that controls Interpol.."

This perception of Interpol as a slow and bungling organisation is not new. In the November 9, 1975 issue of Parade magazine, Robert Walters wrote: "In novels of international intrigue, Interpol is an infallible, high powered, worldwide police department whose agents roam the globe in search of master criminals. But to many veteran law officers who have dealt with Interpol, it is a slow moving, archaic bureaucracy which seldom performs useful work."

"Extracted from: "Interpol - Private Group, Public Menace" 1990 Published by the Church of Scientology International, Los Angeles, CA. USA.