Greene reports…
POLICE Commissioner Henry Greene has reported on his attendance of the 25th Annual General Meeting and Conference of the Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police (ACCP).
It was held from Monday, May 24 to Thursday, May 27, inclusive, at the Wyndham Sugar Bay Resort and Spa, in St. Thomas, United States Virgin Islands and the other attendees were Commissioners from The Bahamas, Barbados, Bermuda, British Virgin Islands (BVI), Cayman Islands, Curacao, Montserrat, St. Kitts and Nevis, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos.
The Deputy Commissioner of Jamaica and a representative from St. Maarten were also present. So, too, were representatives of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the National Organisation of Black Law Executives, the International Criminal Investigation Training Assistance Programme, U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency,  U.S. Naval Criminal Investigative Services, U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) and INTERPOL (International Police Organisation).
Themed ‘Violent Crime in the Caribbean – Defining and Delivering a regional response’, the  conference was preceded by an opening ceremony that was chaired by a high ranking official of the U.S. Virgin Islands and a feature address by the Governor of the U.S. Virgin Islands, Mr. John P. de Jongh.
For the duration, there was a series of plenary sessions on various topics of law enforcement and regional initiatives, including:

* Crime and its attendant challenges on regional security and social development;

* The impact of crime on human development and the attainment of the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs);

* Training deficits in regional policing;

* A strategic assessment of regional capability and capacity to trace small arms;

* Regional drug trends and the movement of drugs in the Caribbean;

* Emergency Management – lessons learnt from hurricane Katrina;

* Combating Police corruption;

* Developing initiatives to respond to gang related violence;

* The impact of crime on regional tourism and

* Understanding childhood diseases and their impact on the criminal       justice System.

Greene said, during closed door sessions, the Commissioners discussed matters relating to the theme extensively and focused particularly on rising crime, gang violence and illegal weapons.
They also looked at reports delivered by every country on the state of leadership of the Force and crime and the role of youths in crime. It was agreed that efforts must be made to do effective social work among the youths so that they may be better able to serve upon becoming adults.
Greene said they also talked about strategies that were used by various countries to curb gang violence and illegal weapons trading.
During the conference, Motorola Foundation, once again, donated the sum of US$30,000 towards a scholarship programme for children of Police ranks who excelled academically but whose parents could not afford to finance their further studies.