Hot Pursuit in Albania – safe and secure borders working for justice
Imagine this scenario, Albanian police spot a minivan smuggling ’migrants’. They immediately start pursuing the van but they can see that the driver is heading for the Montenegrin border. The van crosses the border and the Albanian police must stop pursuit. They cannot cross the border and the smugglers get away; this is the reality that the Hot Pursuit project is fighting against.
The experienced criminal often considers the green (land) border the least challenging to cross. If spotted, police from the country of origin cannot continue the chase once the criminal crosses into the bordering country.
What is Hot Pursuit?
Hot Pursuit is the latest project of the OSCE Presence in Albania (PiA) within its mandate to contributing to addressing Albania’s border management concerns since 2004.
In 2015, the Presence facilitated the establishment of a working group comprised of experts from border police, criminal police, public order, the INTERPOL office, as well as legal experts and prosecutors, tasked with drafting and negotiating Hot Pursuit (HP) Protocols between Albania and its neighbouring countries.
Mira explains that: “the Protocols’ terms were based on international practices and police operation simulations to have a complete view of what would work best in the regional context.”
Under the motto “crime does not recognize borders, police shouldn’t either”, the HP Protocols enable border police of the countries involved to pursue and apprehend suspected criminals, breaking through borders, resulting in stronger tackling of organized crime and human and drug trafficking.
While the signing of a Protocol with Montenegro is still pending, the border police of Albania and Montenegro held a simulation exercise on 16 and 17 October 2019. “The exercise focused on irregular migration, an issue of growing concern in the region in the last years,” Mira says.
Simulation exercise – success in action
The exercise depicts a different outcome to the scenario above: the smugglers might not be stopped within the Albanian territory, but because of the HP protocols, the Montenegrin authorities will have a head start for when the smugglers cross the border. The driver and co-driver see the police approaching; abandon the vehicle with the migrants, and cross the border, where they are promptly apprehended by the co-operating police patrols.
The aim of Hot Pursuit is to make similar success stories a reality in the daily work of border police forces of all countries engaged in the project.
Hot Pursuit membership helps fight crime
The police forces of the signatory countries are allowed to pursue suspected criminals into one-another’s territories, within an agreed range.
The police operation initiated in one of the signatory countries can continue when the suspect crosses the border, and the border police of the second country are notified in advance in order to assist in their capture.
“The Protocols between the countries involved are the first of their kind in the region,” said Mira. Given their novelty to the law-enforcement agencies involved, the OSCE PiA, together with other OSCE field operations, has supported theoretical know-how development and on-the-ground exercises with the police structures of the signatories. This has resulted in significantly increased co-operation and mutual trust between the Albanian border police and their counterparts in the region.”
Moving forward
Criminals will continue to try their luck at crossing the green border; but the Hot Pursuit Protocols are already showing great results.
“Information exchange between border police forces has intensified and improved, and the physical barriers once in place have been reduced,” says Mira. “That is the path we want to see grow.”
In view of the tangible results regarding the green border, the Presence intends to continue supporting Albania’s authorities, with the added consideration of similar interventions in support of maritime border co-operation.
Mira Xhamallati, National Border Management Officer of the OSCE Presence in AlbaniaBorder are indeed used to their best – facilitating free movement of people and goods and keeping countries safe.