The Open Dialog Foundation has addressed a letter to EU representatives, including the European Parliament President, Martin Schulz, and members of the Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs Committee (LIBE) and the Human Rights Subcommittee of the European Parliament (DROI). In addition to highlighting the numerous abuses of Interpol mechanisms by countries with facade democracies, we asked what steps the Union intended to take to promote the reform of the international police.
The Open Dialog has been dealing with specific cases of the system’s victims for a long time now. It is all too common that political prisoners are presented with fabricated and politically motivated charges. Under such pretences, their home countries attempt to have their nationals extradited. Interpol does not look into the nature of the charges though. ODF has described 44 cases in which countries such as Russia, Kazakhstan or Turkey have used Interpol to persecute activists inconvenient to the respective regimes. We have delivered our report, in which we point to the need to reform Interpol, to EU representatives. At the same time, we have requested that the matter be raised by the Union’s institutions with Interpol’s authorities and in direct contact with EU Member States.