West Seeks to Politicize Interpol's Work and Affect Cooperation With Moscow, Russian Diplomat Says

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The West seeks to use the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) for its own political interests and block Russia's access to its channels, Vladimir Tarabrin, the head of the Russian foreign ministry's new challenges and threats department, said in an interview with Sputnik.

The diplomat said that Western states periodically call for limiting Russia's ability to use Interpol channels to search for criminals or even suspending Russia's membership in this organization.

"They [Western countries] seek to use the police organization solely for political interests, to put pressure on its members in order to block Russian law enforcement agencies from accessing Interpol information resources," Tarabrin said, calling such actions "reckless and groundless."

By doing this, the West jeopardizes the main purpose for which Interpol was created — to ensure the unification of the efforts of the national law enforcement agencies in the fight against crime, he added.

In addition, these attempts spur the desire of some participants to change the Charter of Interpol in order to put political pressure on any objectionable government in the future, the diplomat said.

Tarabrin also noted that Moscow has received 60 refusals from Western countries to extradite criminals since March, with almost half of them for political reasons.

"A number of states have officially ceased cooperation with us in extraditing criminals to Russia and in executing requests for legal assistance in criminal cases. For example, if in the first two months of this year, the Russian side received 4 refusals to extradite from Western states due to objective reasons, then, in March-June 2022, 60 refusals were already received, of which at least 28 were for political reasons," Tarabrin said.

Such destructive steps only harm international efforts in combating and preventing crime, leading to a sharp deterioration in the crime situation as a whole, the diplomat said, noting that the only one who will benefit from such short-sighted steps are criminals.