Organization of American States
www.oas.org

 

(E-032-A/02)

February 15, 2002

TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO TO HOST OAS JUSTICE MINISTERS' MEETING

 The government of Trinidad and Tobago will host the Fourth Meeting of Ministers of Justice and Attorneys General of the Americas in Port-of-Spain, next March 10 to 13.  The conference is  being convened under a resolution passed by the Organization of American States (OAS) General Assembly last June. 

An agreement to host the meeting was signed in Washington Friday by the OAS Assistant Secretary General, Ambassador Luigi Einaudi, and Trinidad and Tobago's Interim Representative, Mackisack Logie.  Logie thanked the OAS General Secretariat for collaborating with the Special Committee on Justice, which prepared the agenda and is organizing the event.   Logie chaired that Committee. 

For his part, Ambassador Einaudi stressed that a fundamental purpose of the OAS, "as an organization of governments, is in fact the harmonization of law and of legal cooperation," adding that the upcoming meeting promises to be "an important chapter in legal cooperation" in addressing some "very fundamental questions in the emerging regional agenda." 

At its regular meeting Wednesday, the OAS Permanent Council approved the agenda for the Port-of-Spain gathering where the ministers and attorneys general will consider such topics as legal and judicial cooperation in fighting transnational organized crime and terrorism; extradition; cooperation to repatriate ill-gotten gains; improving the administration of justice, including alternative means of conflict resolution; cyber crime and a report by the Justice Studies Center of the Americas.  

Costa Rica hosted the last Meeting—in March 2000—where the Hemisphere's Justice Ministers considered a broad range of issues. 

 

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