Europol Drugs Unit: annual report 1996

The Committee has adopted, with amendments, the draft report by Martin SCHULZ (PES, D) on the 1996 annual report of the Europol Drugs Unit. According to Mr Schulz, the 1996 report does not contain sufficient information, probably owing to the unclear situation in which the EDU is having to operate (the legal base remains weak). However, the figures for 1997 show a decline in the number of cases related to drugs (61%) and money-laundering (9%), a more than two-fold increase in the number linked to illegal immigration (19%), no change in the number of requests relating to trafficking in stolen cars, a very slight increase in the number of cases linked to illegal trafficking in radioactive or nuclear substances and 81 new cases concerning trafficking in human beings. The report calls on the Member States and the bodies of the EDU to emphasise, in their preparations for the entry into force of the Europol Convention, the new professionalism now demanded of the officers of all the forces responsible for enforcing the law and combatting crime. In this connection, it calls for adequate training measures to be carried out in the Member States, for improved knowledge of the EDU and its objectives to be promoted and new instruments and equipment matching the level to which crime has developed to be made available to police forces in the Member States.�