21st ASEAN Senior Officials’ Meeting on Transnational Crime continues

The third-day meetings of the 21st ASEAN Senior Officials’ Meeting on Transnational Crime (21st SOMTC) continued yesterday. The meetings were held with Canada, New Zealand and the European Union (EU), separately.
At the meeting of SOMTC and Canada, co-chaired by the Deputy Chief of Myanmar Police Force and the leader of the delegation from Myanmar, two parties exchanged views on possible areas for cooperation in the fight against transnational crime during the COVID-19 pandemic and discussed the status of the ASEAN-Canada Action Plan on Combatting Terrorism and Transna tional Crime 2019-2022 and the new projects.
At the SOMTC-EU meeting, co-chaired by Singapore and the European Union, Myanmar discussed the need for the SOMTC-EU Action Plan 2022-2024 to include the steps to increase technical cooperation on cybercrime that will become a haven for extremists and suggested that the actual situation of the countries and the real news should be known and acted upon.
At the meeting, co-chaired by the leader of the Laos delegation and the leader of the United States SOMTC delegation, the Myanmar representative also said exchange information on terrorists and fugitive criminals and the transfer of defendants and evidence to the judiciary needs to be carried out under the laws of the countries.
He urged to effectively prevent the support and the granting of asylum to terrorists and criminals, adding Myanmar is ready to sign MoU with ASEAN nations, including the United States to combat transnational crime, in accord with the existing law.
The 21st SOMTC was hosted by Brunei Darussalam from 27 July through videoconferencing and the discussion from the meetings will be included in the implementation of transnational crime prevention plans in the ASEAN region and will be submitted to the ASEAN Ministerial Meeting on Combatting Transnational Crime. — MNA