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Interpol is one of the oldest, largest and most famous law enforcement agencies in the world. It has inspired two television series and played a role in countless novels and movies, its globe trotting agents hopping across international borders to snare fugitives, terrorists and spies. The only problem is most of what people think Interpol does is fiction. Its agents aren't allowed to make arrests, don't carry guns, and rarely leave the office.
As correspondent Steve Kroft explains,
their real job is behind the scenes, collecting and disseminating information to law enforcement agencies all over the world, and until Ron Noble became the first American to ever run the global police organization, it played almost no role in fighting terrorism. Noble has been trying to change all that since the day he took over seven years ago, less than a year before Sept. 11th changed the world.
When he was nominated by President Clinton to become the first non-European secretary general of Interpol,
Noble was one of the top law enforcement administrators in the U.S.: undersecretary of the Department of the Treasury, in charge of the Secret Service and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
The lights at Interpol are on now around the clock, seven days a week. The international wanted posters, called "red notices," once sent out by third class mail to 186 countries, often took months to arrive.
Now they leave Lyon in a matter of seconds on a secure Internet channel. And the Morse code tower, used into the 1980s, has been replaced by a state-of-the-art police communication system that allows countries instant access to a global database of fingerprints, mug shots, DNA samples and stolen travel documents.
Its
mission is to
give operational support to police departments around the world, by exchanging intelligence, tracking fugitives, and providing language and legal assistance in fighting crimes that cross international borders. Its staff is made up of police officers on loan from 58 different countries.
Walk into any office at Interpol and you might find a German tracking stolen art, an American unraveling a new drug route through West Africa, or a French woman investigating a counterfeit malaria drug.
Interpol has the world's only database on lost or stolen passports and travel documents. There are more than 15 million of them and every week 3,000 people try to use one to enter a country illegally.
"Every significant international terrorist attack that's occurred has been linked in some way with either a fraudulent passport, an authentic passport that's been modified or with a counterfeit passport," Noble explains.
"So by catching the people with stolen passports, you get yourself closer to catching terrorists."
The system has been operational for more than two years,
but the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is just now beginning to phase it in at some border locations. Noble says it's
just one sign of U.S. reluctance to cooperate with international organizations, when it comes to terrorism."
