British Criminals in Spain to feel force of UK's newest crime-fighters
Organised criminals who believe they can evade arrest by hiding in Spain will feel the full force of the UK’s newest crime fighting agency when it goes live this month.
From 7 October the National Crime Agency (NCA) will use more than 4,000 specialist crime fighters to tackle some of the world’s toughest and most organised criminals. The new agency will strengthen relations between law enforcement in the UK and Spain.
The NCA will build on its work with a range of agencies including the Spanish National Police, Guardia Civil and Spanish Customs to tackle threats including economic crime, criminal finances and profits, organised immigration crime and emerging threats such as e-crime. Of particular interest to both countries will be cocaine and cannabis entering the UK via Spain from Latin America and North and West Africa.
The new agency will also focus on the activities of British organised criminals based in Spain. It will continue to work closely with Spanish partners under Operation Captura, which has seen 53 of the UK’s most wanted criminals arrested. The operation will continue to be a threat to British fugitives residing in Spain.
Criminals will be targeted across the globe as the NCA tackles international threats abroad before they reach the UK border. Led by 120 liaison officers in 40 global locations, the NCA’s reach will stretch across 150 countries.
The NCA will work with partners in Spain to tackle organised crime groups in-country, share intelligence on joint threats and targets, and intercept people, property and money moving to and from the UK.
David Armond, Director of Border Policing Command for the NCA, said:
Tackling serious and organised crime goes way beyond the shores of the United Kingdom. Some of the biggest threats to the national security of countries around the globe come from individuals and crime groups who globally cost us billions of pounds every year and ruin lives and communities.
These people must be stopped, and the NCA will lead the UK’s law enforcement role at an international level.
The NCA will be a powerful crime fighting agency, with more than 4,000 crime fighters working with partners at home and abroad to cut serious and organised crime.
The new agency will have a much wider remit than its predecessors, with an additional focus on cyber crime, fraud and economic crime alongside the more familiar types of serious and organised criminal activity such as drugs, child sexual exploitation, human trafficking and firearms.
When it launches on 7 October, the NCA will lead the UK’s fight to cut serious and organised crime by building on the cutting-edge technologies and expertise of officers from its key predecessor organisations, including the Serious and Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) and the Child Exploitation and Online Protection (CEOP) centre.
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