The Interpol has issued the first Silver Notice on the request of Italy which has sought information about the assets of a senior mafia member.
About Silver Notice
- The Silver Notice is the newest addition to the Organization’s suite of colour-coded Notices and Diffusions.
- The Interpol’s 91st General Assembly, held in Vienna, in 2023 outlined the development and implementation of the Silver Notice and Diffusion pilot through a resolution.
- The Silver Notice project is being launched as part of a pilot phase involving 52 countries and territories, which will run at least until November 2025.
- Under the project, 500 notices can be requested which will be equally divided among the participating countries.
- The information about notices or individuals for whom information is being sought by a country will not be made public by the Interpol.
- The countries can request “information on assets linked to a person’s criminal activities such as fraud, corruption, drug trafficking, environmental crime and other serious offenses” through Silver Notices disseminated to all 196 members or Silver Diffusion notices sent to select countries.
- The Interpol General Secretariat will review every Silver Notice and Diffusion for compliance with the Organisation’s rules prior to its publication or circulation.
- Stripping criminals and their networks of illegal profits is one of the most powerful ways to fight transnational organised crime, especially considering that 99% of criminal assets remain unrecovered. India has at least 10 fugitive economic offenders.
How will India Benefit
- The Silver notice will help India to locate assets of criminals who have transferred their illicit wealth to tax havens and other countries thinking that it will never be traced or accounted for.
- There is no accurate estimation of the total amount of black money which has been transferred offshore.
Interpol’s colour-coded notices
At present, the Interpol has eight types of colour-coded notices which allows a member country to seek specific kind of information worldwide.
- Red Notice seeks to locate and arrest people wanted for prosecution or to serve a sentence. The Yellow Notice helps locate missing persons, often minors, or identify persons who are unable to identify themselves.
- The Blue Notice collects additional information about a person’s identity, location or activities in relation to a criminal investigation.
- The Black Notice is issued to seek information on unidentified bodies.
- The Green Notice is for providing warning about a person’s criminal activities, where the person is considered to be a possible threat to public safety.
- The Orange Notice warns of an event, a person, an object or a process representing a serious and imminent threat to public safety.
- The Purple Notice seeks or provides information on modus operandi, objects, devices and concealment methods used by criminals.
- Interpol’s United Nations Security Council Special Notice is issued for entities and individuals who are the targets of UN Security Council Sanctions Committees.
About Interpol
- The Lyon (France) based International Criminal Police Organization or INTERPOL is an inter-governmental organization.
- It has 196 member countries, and it helps police in all of them to work together to make the world a safer place.
- In each country, an INTERPOL National Central Bureau (NCB) provides the central point of contact for the General Secretariat and other NCBs.
- An NCB is run by national police officials and usually sits in the government ministry responsible for policing.
(Sources: Interpol & The Hindu)
