Police Fully Prepared For Un Leaders' Meeting

Police fully prepared for UN leaders' meeting

BANGKOK: -- The assistant national police chief today pronounced that the Thai police force fully prepared for the security arrangements for tomorrow's UN leadership meeting, when the heads of several nations will meet as part of the 11th UN Congress on Crime Suppression and Criminal Justice.

"There should not be any security problems over the final three days of the meeting, as there have been no indications of unrest", said Pol. Lt. Gen. Nawin Singkaphalin, who heads the police centre for security and traffic.

"Nonetheless, we have ordered officers not to be negligent", he noted.

He also gave assurances over the security arrangements for an event for the leaders to be held tomorrow evening at the Royal Navy headquarters, saying that the Navy would be responsible for security inside the building, while the police would take responsibility for the security arrangements outside the building.

Road and river traffic will be blocked tomorrow evening for the event, which will conclude with a light and sound show and a fireworks display on the Chao Phraya River.

Meanwhile, delegates at the UN crime conference have discussed the problems of transnational organized crime, including terrorism and economic crime, including human trafficking and fibre crime.

Like other participating countries, Thailand has pledged to cooperate with the international community in anti-terrorism drives, saying that the country is now a signatory of five key anti-terrorism treaties.

Pointing to the fact that transnational crime is normally linked to money laundrying practices, the UN has, thus, urged member states to seriously push for the enforcement of their anti money laundrying laws to suppress all forms of the transnational crime.

The international delegates have also discussed the problem of violence and human rights violation against children, saying that in Asia alone, there are about 44-46 million children, aged 7-14, having been forced to be child labour, while a number more of them are sexually abused.

The delegates have called for UN measures to concretely address the problems.

Thailand is hosting the UN crime conference between 18-25 April, in which more than 4,000 delegates from all over the world, including government leaders, representatives from international and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and experts, are taking part.

--TNA 2005-04-22