ANTI-HUMAN TRAFFICKING TRAINING
The Ministry of Immigration, Citizenship, Labour and Employment Services along with the Office of the Director of Prosecutions and the Attorney General Chambers continues to meet its Anti-money laundering and human smuggling objectives through training in keeping with the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force.
As part of The Immigration Department efforts to sensitize law enforcement bodies of the issues surrounding illegal human trafficking and smuggling of persons and other predicate offences in the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Department hosted a series of training sessions on Providenciales and Grand Turk.
The initial training session was undertaken October 9 – 10, 2019 on Providenciales. During that session, a total of twenty (20) law enforcement officers of the Immigration Department, Police, Customs, and Customer Service Department participated.in the workshop. The training was hosted at the Police Department Training Room, South Dock, Providenciales.
The second training session was held on Grand Turk, March 4 – 6, 2020. These sessions were attended by over thirty (30) law enforcement officers from the Police, Customs, Attorney General Chambers, Labour, Labour Tribunal and Customer Service Department.
The Grand Turk training session was hosted at the SPPD Conference Room, South Base, Grand Turk. The workshop was facilitated by staff of the Immigration Department Attorney General Chambers and the Director of Public Prosecutions.
During the training sessions participants were introduced to the laws that cover human smuggling, how to identify a smuggled person and smuggler, rights of smuggled persons and the conventions that govern such activities person,
Other important topics included: Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing which can also be linked to human trafficking and smuggling.
As the law enforcement officers of the Turks and Caicos Islands join in together to try and combat human trafficking and smuggling in the Turks and Caicos Islands this time the immigration department took the training to Grand Turk.
Assistant Director of Immigration, Mr. Peter Parker, noted; “We cannot avoid the reality and overlook the fact that the human smuggling and trafficking of persons in the Turks and Caicos Islands is real.”
“There is evidence of such and law enforcement officer of the Turks and Caicos Islands must be equipped with the right tools, knowledge, and training to combat this growing problem.”