Main area: Peace and security
Theme: Activities involving partner country police
Assessment: ODA-eligible
Provider country: Austria
Recipient country: Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Sierra Leone
Implementing agency: UNODC in partnership with UNDPA, UNOWA, DPKO, ICPO-Interpol
Budget (USD x 1000): 14 548, contribution Austria: 996
Year(s): Since 2013
Purpose code: 16063 Narcotics control
Case number: Peace and Security / 23
Support to Trans-national Crime Units in West Africa
This regional project supports the creation and strengthening of Transnational Crime Units (TCUs) in five ECOWAS member states. It supports the national TCU operations and develops the required linkages with ongoing national, regional, bilateral and multilateral actions conducted in West Africa to support the implementation of the “ECOWAS Action Plan to Address the Growing Problem of Illicit Drug Trafficking, Organised Crime and Drug Abuse in West Africa”, specifically item 1.5.2: “create/strengthen centralised inter-institutional investigative agencies/departments/units for the control of illicit drug trafficking and organised crime in each member state”.
The project will promote and support the appropriate information exchange and operational cooperation of TCU’s with:
Drugs/organised crime units in other ECOWAS member states;
Specialised airport and seaport control units operating in West African countries;
National and regional INTERPOL National Central Bureaus (NCB); and,
Regional enforcement operations supported by ECOWAS and by the international law enforcement community in West Africa.
TCUs’ operations are integrated into national and regional law enforcement structures.
The three TCUs in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea-Bissau are fully operational.
TCUs have been established and are operational in Côte d’Ivoire and the Republic of Guinea.
TCUs participate in regional and international law enforcement operations, leading to an increase of seizures and prosecutions.
This activity is deemed ODA-eligible. It demonstrates the rules on activities involving partner country police, specifically with regard to financing for police functions pursuant to preventing and addressing criminal activities, and the provision of related non-lethal equipment and training in the context of countering transnational organised crime (see DCD/DAC(2024)40/FINAL, paragraph 124). The following safeguards are met:
Narcotics control expenditures are limited to activities that focus on economic development and welfare. Activities by the donor country to interdict drug supplies destroy crops or train or finance military personnel in anti-narcotics activities are not reportable (see DCD/DAC(2024)40/ADD1/FINAL, footnote 20).
The supply of equipment intended to convey a threat of, or deliver, lethal force, is not reportable as ODA and training in counter-subversion methods, suppression of political dissidence, or intelligence gathering on political activities are excluded from ODA (see DCD/DAC(2024)40/FINAL, paragraph 125). [Intelligence gathering does not refer to data collection for development purposes nor to preventative or investigatory activities by law enforcement agencies in the context of routine policing to uphold the rule of law, including countering transnational organised crime (see DCD/DAC(2024)40/FINAL, footnote 43).]
This activity also complies with the rules on provider engagement in partner country’s security sector reform (see DCD/DAC(2024)40/FINAL, paragraph 129).
This document was approved by the Development Assistance Committee under a written procedure on 20 October 2017 and prepared for publication by the OECD Secretariat.
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