Under Secretary Hormats' Remarks at the Roundtable on Wildlife Trafficking at the University of Pretoria

As Prepared 

Thank you for the kind introduction. I would also like to thank the University of Pretoria Center for Wildlife Management and the Mammal Research Institute for hosting us today. I am honored to share this panel with Mr. Fundesile Mketeni from the Department of Environmental Affairs and Dr. Mike Knight of the IUCN, both experts in the field and deeply involved in fighting the horrible scourge of rhino poaching happening in South Africa. And, I welcome Julian Rademeyer as our moderator. His knowledge of the situation and criminal networks will guide us in a meaningful discussion today.

The U.S. Department of State has long considered wildlife trafficking to be a critical conservation issue. However, wildlife trafficking and poaching have exploded in the past several years into a large-scale, commercial illicit enterprise with increasing involvement by transnational criminal groups. This trend has made wildlife crime a particularly high priority for me. Moreover, ending wildlife trafficking is a high priority for me personally because I lived in East Africa for a year. I spent several months as an assistant game guide in the region’s majestic parks. I also visited Kruger National Park in South Africa and Etosha National Park in Namibia. I saw many of Africa’s animals up close and personal and came to love and admire them.

During my visit to southern Africa last year with Secretary Clinton, we heard firsthand of the devastation the brutal poachers are causing for the populations of these majestic animals, and the communities which depend on them. Communities suffer when their wildlife is slaughtered and stolen, both economically and personally. From the rising numbers of rangers and eco-guards murdered from Kenya to Cameroon, and across the continent, we see that the toll of poaching and trafficking is not counted in the horrible slaughter of animal lives alone. The insecurity spread by lawless, armed poachers—criminal syndicates and gangs—crossing national borders with impunity adds risk to daily life and prevents these communities from developing sustainable means of economic prosperity. Very few companies are willing to invest in a place where physical security is virtually non-existent, and tourists that would otherwise come and pay to view wildlife roaming freely likewise will spend their money in safer places.

Reducing demand is central to stopping the illegal trade in wildlife.

Our governments and citizens cannot afford to stand idle while poachers and wildlife traffickers hunt and slaughter elephants, rhinos, tigers, bears, or any species often to extinction. The Department of State has elevated our efforts to combat wildlife trafficking. I have made this a top priority of my job. Former Secretary Hillary Clinton hosted an event at the State Department last fall – a Call to Action from governments, businesses, NGOs, and citizens to enhance their efforts to combat wildlife trafficking. She also called for an intelligence assessment to help us understand the networks involved and identify how these products and associate financial flows are moving across borders. We are doing a lot to increase action to combat wildlife trafficking. Over the last year, I have hosted roundtable discussions with Ambassadors in Washington, D.C. to discuss how wildlife demand and supply countries can work together.

During my recent trip to China, I had very useful and concrete discussions with Chinese leaders on improving enforcement efforts and reducing demand for illegal wildlife products in both of our countries. In recent months our Embassies and consulates around the world have stepped up their efforts to support governments that are seeking to stop wildlife slaughter and trafficking. Our missions are actively highlighting the issue through public outreach efforts, such as roundtable discussions, film screenings, and web chats.

Internationally, we recently were able to elevate wildlife trafficking as a “serious crime” through a resolution passed at the UN Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice, which the United States and Peru co-sponsored. Under UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, “serious crimes” receive minimum sentences of four years in prison. In many instances wildlife smugglers are released after paying fines significantly lower than the value of the illegal goods, so for them the risk is well worth the reward. To them, fines are simply the cost of doing business, not a punishment or deterrent.

We also support law enforcement training through our International Law Enforcement Academies (ILEAs) programs in Gaborone and Bangkok. These centers provide law enforcement training to strengthen wildlife crime investigations. Since 2005 we have worked with other governments and international partners, the CITES Secretariat, Interpol, the UN Office of Drugs and Crime and the World Customs Organization, to establish regional Wildlife Enforcement Networks or WENs. We were pleased to sponsor the first global meeting of the WENs During the CITES Conference of the Parties in Bangkok this past March, we called for the creation of a global system of regional wildlife enforcement networks.

We believe that increasing communication and coordination across the numerous existing and emerging regional wildlife enforcement networks will increase their own success while enhancing the global efforts to confront the transnational aspects of wildlife trafficking. We welcome the interest of other regions to establish WENs or similar cooperative arrangements. We must work together to stem the tide of destruction before it is too late. Stopping wildlife crime is an urgent matter. It is a major challenge and something we must do for our children, our grandchildren, and generations to come.

Thank you again for your participation today and for your interest in and commitment to protecting our planet’s wildlife.

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Remarks at INL Partner Appreciation Ceremony

Commissioners, superintendents, chiefs, directors, deputy assistant attorneys general, attorney general, ladies and gentlemen, may I start by recognizing two particularly important representatives with us here this morning – both here to show their support to local law enforcement in the state or district that they represent. We are truly honored to have among us today the distinguished senator from the state of Illinois, Mark Kirk, the distinguished representative from the state of New York, and specifically the city of New York, Eliot Engel. Gentlemen, may I say to everyone else in this room, I regard Senator Kirk and Representative Engel not just as fine members of the United States Congress, but also as great friends – friends to me personally, but also as friends to the Department of State and to the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. Gentlemen, welcome and thank you for coming.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are gathered today in essence to reinforce a common theme, common to everyone in this room. And that theme is: what happens overseas, what we do overseas, has a direct and immediate impact on our homes, our streets, and our communities here in the United States of America. We have learned, ladies and gentlemen, that what happens in the military world and the foreign policy world, in the economic world, has an impact on us here in the United States. But we had to learn, perhaps, the hard way over the last 10 or 15 years, that it has an impact on the law enforcement world in the United States as well.

May I say to everyone in this room, and particularly everyone in the first two rows here that I am exceptionally proud of the partnership with federal law enforcement for the past 35 years. Without that partnership between the Department of State, responsible for foreign affairs and foreign relations, and the federal law enforcement agencies, many, many good things that have occurred since the year 1975 would not have occurred. That partnership has delivered real results for the American people.

But we have learned as well over the past 10 years that state and local enforcement must be part of the solution as well. And those who do not understand what I am saying do not have to think much further back than the 11^th of September of the year 2001, when more than 2,400 New Yorkers lost their lives, or those whose memories are even shorter need think back only four or so weeks ago when, on the streets of Boston near the finish line of the most famous marathon in the world, hundreds of Boston residents and visitors were victims of a horrible crime.

Ladies and gentlemen, this ceremony reflects the simple rule that we are one team in this effort. It is team USA and the team is comprised of federal players, state players, and local/municipal players as well. They are police and law enforcement, they are prosecutors, they are corrections officials, because we need each element in that rule of law continuum if we are going to be successful in these efforts overseas.

Today, ladies and gentlemen, you will learn how a group of approximately 65 New York police officers who are Haitian American have had an impact on hundreds of Haitian national police and thousands, if not tens of thousands, of Haitian citizens. And those of you who wish to see more of this should stroll by my office on the 7^th floor of this building and see, Commissioner, the 40 foot-long mural that sits in front of the door to my office, which shows a New York police officer engaging the local community in Haiti, a photograph which I decided to place there because it shows all the elements that we are trying to establish in our overseas operations. Law enforcement, yes, but tied to the community, working with the community, and projecting the most positive image possible of the United States of America overseas.

You will hear later today, ladies and gentlemen, about how the Atlanta Police Department has provided training to law enforcement in Timor-Leste and provided training to women Pakistani police officers in Atlanta.

You will hear about how the Chicago Police Department has provided training in Honduras, elsewhere in Central America, and in Mexico on efforts to combat gangs and to investigate and solve homicides.

You will learn how the New Mexico Corrections Department has trained corrections officers from Guatemala, Honduras, and Belize. And, more than 5,100 corrections officers from Mexico became the core cadre of the entire Mexican corrections community.

You will hear how the Colorado Corrections Department has provided training to dozens and dozens of corrections officers from other countries, including most recently from Afghanistan. And I suggest to you that that training, that relationship, those results do in fact provide a fitting memorial to the late director of the Colorado Corrections Department, Mr. Tom Clements.

You will learn today how the Delaware Attorney General provided prosecutors to train prosecutors in Montenegro, providing them with the sort of education and knowledge and training to allow them to provide genuine justice and rule of law in a relatively new country.

You will learn how the Library of Congress, and specifically the Law Library of Congress, an institution that we do not normally associate with law enforcement, provided an absolutely essential service in preparing us for more than 25 overseas missions in providing us the background, the history, and the detail necessary on those countries, their legal systems, their law enforcement communities, and the issues that we would address.

And finally, you will hear about a federal – a fellow federal agency, the Department of Justice, and specifically its ICITAP Office, which yes, Dr. Swartz , I do know stands for International Criminal Investigative Assistance and Training Program, an organization with which INL has had a close working relationship for more than 25 years in dozens of different countries. And may I say to you as well, Dr. Swartz , that after this event I will go upstairs to our Memorial Wall dedication, and on that wall will appear the name of an old friend of mine from the year 1982 when I was a very young man serving in El Salvador. His name was Kris Kriskovich, a former FBI agent who went on to become the first Director of ICITAP and who did, in fact, die in a helicopter crash in Bosnia in the 1990s. This award to ICITAP today is a fitting reminder and honor to him and the work that he did.

So ladies and gentlemen, may I suggest to you that we, together, this past year and for the preceding 20 or 25 years, have done some great things and have some real accomplishments. There is one thing that we have failed to do from the INL side of the Department of State, and that is to say thank you to each and every one of you. And we are going to begin to rectify that right now.

With that, Dr. Barclay, over to you.

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Assistant Secretary of State William R. Brownfield and NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly Brief at the Department of State Regarding Police Week Events

Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs William R. Brownfield and New York Police Department Commissioner Raymond Kelly will conduct a special press briefing at 11:30 a.m. Monday, May 13, in the Press Briefing Room at the U.S. Department of State. Commissioner Kelly and Assistant Secretary Brownfield will discuss ongoing efforts by the U.S. Department of State to build linkages between U.S. state and local law enforcement agencies and foreign criminal justice counterparts.

For the past two years, Commissioner Kelly’s New York Police Department has coordinated with the Department of State to deploy 68 Haitian-American police officers to Haiti for 90 day rotations to build capacity for the Haitian National Police.

Media representatives may attend this event upon presentation of one of the following: (1) A U.S. government-issued identification card (Department of State, White House, Congress, Department of Defense or Foreign Press Center), (2) a media-issued photo identification card, or (3) a letter from their employer on letterhead verifying their employment as a journalist, accompanied by an official photo identification card (driver's license, passport).

For further information, please contact the U.S. Department of State Office of Press Relations at (202) 647-2492.

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External links to other Internet sites should not be construed as an endorsement of the views or privacy policies contained therein.

Armenian Training in Partnership with Wisconsin Department of Corrections

Corrections officials from the Republic of Armenia began a three-week training program with the Wisconsin Department of Corrections (WIDOC) facilities in Madison and Oshkosh on April 27. The Armenian officials are examining methods of classifying inmates more efficiently based on behavior, risk, and other factors. Officials will also attend workshops on security, emergency response, and community alternatives to incarceration. The Department of State’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) and the Wisconsin Department of Corrections collaborated on the curriculum and logistics for this training.

INL and WIDOC signed a Memorandum of Understanding in 2011 to provide training for international corrections and prisons personnel. WIDOC is one of more than 50 U.S. state and local agency partners from communities around the United States who help foreign law enforcement and justice officials enhance their civilian security and justice sector capacity. Through these agreements, U.S. partners develop networks of contacts with foreign counterparts that assist them in stemming the tide of illicit drugs and transnational crime that are entering their own communities. Making international law enforcement connections on drug-related and gang-related issues has a long-term impact on cross-border, state-level, and community security. This is the first international training provided by WIDOC under the terms of the MOU and cooperative agreement with INL.

The training graduation ceremony in Madison will be open to the press on May 15th. For further information on the exchange or to attend the graduation ceremony, please contact INL public affairs at inl-papd@state.gov. To receive updates on INL activities, follow the Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs on Twitter @INLbureau and Facebook at www.facebook.com/StateINL.

The Office of Website Management, Bureau of Public Affairs, manages this site as a portal for information from the U.S. State Department.
External links to other Internet sites should not be construed as an endorsement of the views or privacy policies contained therein.