Government helps Asia-Pacific crime-fighters tap into CTCP’s expertise

Apr 20, 2007

The University of Wollongong’s Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention (CTCP) is playing a key role in the Australian Government’s efforts to build transnational crime-fighting capacity in the Asia-Pacific region.

Fifteen AusAID scholarship-holders from Pakistan, China, Cambodia, The Philippines, Fiji, Vietnam and the Cook Islands are among the 55 students from 14 countries in this year’s intake for CTCP’s Masters degrees and Graduate Certificates in Transnational Crime Prevention. There are also 17 Australian students, many of whom are Australian Federal Police (AFP) officers.

The students include police and law enforcement officers, anti-terrorism and intelligence chiefs, judiciary officials and bureaucrats. The scholarships are part of a $3 million commitment Foreign Minister Alexander Downer made in 2006 to provide 60 AusAID scholarships at CTCP over the next three years.

A number of the other international students have been have been sponsored by the AFP to undertake the courses, which teach skills to fight transnational crime such as narcotics production and trafficking, firearms and people trafficking, smuggling, fraud, corruption, money laundering, internet crime, paedophile activity, natural resources poaching and illegal shipment of hazardous waste.

CTCP Director Professor Doug MacKinnon said the government’s commitment to the program was all about building crime-fighting capacity in countries in South-east Asia and the Pacific.

“This is a unique degree and it is gratifying to see the government supporting it so strongly, through the provision of AusAID scholarships and AFP support for law enforcement officers from overseas, and by sending a large contingent of AFP officers as well,” Professor MacKinnon said.

“Apart from what the students are learning in the classroom, they are also exchanging experiences and ideas and building international networks and friendships. By its very nature transnational crime crosses borders so these networks are likely to be very valuable in the years ahead.”

Fijian police officer and AusAID scholarship-holder Rajas Swamy agrees. Mr Swamy, a member of the Fijian Transnational Crime Unit for the past six years who is currently seconded to the Financial Intelligent Unit of Fiji’s Reserve Bank, is enjoying the Masters course which he says is ideally structured for his work which includes investigating money laundering and the financing of terrorism from the proceeds of crime.

However, he believes the opportunity to spend a year in Wollongong studying with colleagues from other countries will be just as valuable.

“This course is about capacity-building, but it is also about networking with people working in the same field in other countries and developing international cooperation,” he said.