Arafat joins ministerial conference on drug trafficking in Mauritius

State Minister for Information and Broadcasting Mohammad Ali Arafat has joined the first ministerial conference on drug trafficking and substance abuse in the Western Indian Ocean in Mauritius.

The conference was held at Intercontinental Resort in Balaclava, Mauritius on Thursday, a ministry release said on Friday.

Ministers and delegation heads from different countries, including Arafat, discussed strategies to combat drug trafficking and abuse of drugs.

The conference emphasised establishing a network of leading national organisations to coordinate the drug response through regional cooperation structures and a regional drug observatory.

The challenges highlighted by the participants in the conference are additional risk of drug use by youths, risk of destabilising enforcement of law and cross-border security, illegal financial flows, transnational crime, destroying family and social peace, threats to maritime security, the growing threat of synthetic drugs, flaws in the legal framework and increasing volume of drug production and drug markets.

To address the challenges, they proposed increasing maritime surveillance and developing cross-border cooperation, partnership of all concerned stakeholders to disrupt and destroy drug trafficking networks, taking separate regional responsibilities, bringing partners together on regional maritime security established by the Indian Ocean Commission (IOC), training across the world and enhancing bilateral cooperation including police and customs cooperation between Indian Ocean countries.

Other recommendations were to reconsider and renew strategies to resolve drug related problems, review legal frameworks and international cooperation, work in close collaboration with international organisations such as the IOC and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, making commitment to sustainable development after reducing drug abuse and overall organised crime by following the examples of those who successfully dealt with drug trafficking and drug abuse.

The Bangladesh state minister discussed different issues with Mauritius Prime Minister Pravind Jugnauth on the sidelines of the conference.

He invited Pravind to visit Bangladesh on behalf of Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. 

A total of 24 countries and 26 organisations joined the conference.

At the end of the conference, the declaration of the conference was adopted.