DUSHANBE, February 27, 2014, Asia-Plus – Director of the Drug Control Agency under the President of Tajikistan (DCA), Rustam Nazarov, was on a working visit to Kazakhstan on February 25-26.
During the visit, Tajik drug control chief reportedly met with Nurtai Abykayev, Chairman of the National Security Committee (NSC) of Kazakhstan.
According to the DCA press center, the two exchanged views on bilateral cooperation and priorities of cooperation in combating drug trafficking in the region.
A special attention was given to the drug situation that may emerge in the region in 2014 after the withdrawal of international coalition forces from Afghanistan.
Nazarov and Abykayev reportedly informed each other about the drug situation in their countries and shared their visions of further expansion bilateral cooperation between Tajik DCA and Kazakh NSC.
The sides also discussed problems related to the methodology of estimating Afghan narcotics smuggled through the so-called Northern Route of Afghan opiates trafficking.
On February 25, Tajik drug control chief reportedly attended an extraordinary session of the Council of National Coordinators of Member Nations of the Central Asian Regional Information and Coordination Center for Combating Illicit Trafficking of Narcotic Drugs, Psychotropic Substances and their Precursors (CARICC) in Almaty. The meeting resulted in signing of appropriate resolutions.
In response to the need to improve inter-agency cooperation between law enforcement agencies at a national, regional and international level to counter the problem of drug trafficking from Afghanistan, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) together with the parties to a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on sub-regional drug control cooperation Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan launched a project to establish a Central Asian Regional Information and Coordination Center (CARICC) in late 2004.
On February 7-8, 2006, the institutional documents on the establishment of CARICC, developed by the experts of the participating countries and UNODC, were endorsed at the seventh ministerial review meeting of the parties to MoU held in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Almaty, Kazakhstan was agreed as a location of the Center.
The purpose of the Center is to facilitate information exchange and analysis, and to assist in the coordination of operational activities of the various law enforcement agencies in the region – police, drug control agencies, customs, border guards, security services of the countries involved.
