The
UK Presidency of the G8 – Justice and Home Affairs
Background
The G8 (or “Group of Eight”) is a multilateral
group consisting of the world's major industrial democracies:
Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United
Kingdom, and the United States. The European Commission
attends G8 meetings as an observer. The G8 address a
wide range of international economic, political, and
security issues.
The G8 has its origin at an economic summit in 1975
convened by President Valery Giscard d’Estaing
of France and attended by leaders from Germany, Japan,
the United Kingdom, and the United States. Italy and
Canada joined this original “Group of Five”
in 1976-7. Whilst Russia started to be involved in G7
meetings in 1992, it was only in 1998 that the name
was formally changed to “G8”.
Work on Transnational Organised Crime
After the 1995 Summit in Halifax, Nova Scotia, a group
of experts was brought together to look for better ways
to fight international crime. In 1996, this group (later
known as the “Lyon Group”) produced Forty
Recommendations to combat international crime that were
endorsed by the G8 Heads of State at their Summit Meeting
in Lyon in June 1996. “Subgroups” of the
Lyon Group thereafter were formed to address specific
crime-related issues (e.g., legal processes for evidence-sharing,
high-tech crime, and immigrations fraud and human trafficking).
In December 1997, U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno hosted
the first-ever meeting of her counterparts from the
G8 countries and the Ministers issued their first joint
Communiqué which endorsed the work of the Lyon
group. The last three Presidencies of the G8 have hosted
meetings of Justice and Home Affairs ministers. The
Home Secretary will host a similar meeting in 2005.
Changes following September 11, 2001
In October 2001, senior representative of G8 Justice
and Home Affairs Ministries met in Rome to discuss steps
for the G8 to take to combat international terrorism
and decided to combine the G8's Lyon Group (fighting
transnational organised crime) and the G8's Roma Group
(fighting international terrorism). Since that time,
the Lyon/Roma Group has met three times annually in
joint session. While continuing important work to combat
transnational organised crime, the group uses its resources
to combat terrorism through such avenues as enhancements
to legal systems, transport security, and tools for
investigating terrorist uses of the Internet.
Meetings under the UK Presidency of the G8,
2005
The UK will convene 3 meetings of the Lyon / Roma group.
These will be in January, April and November. They will
be chaired by senior officials from the Home Office
and Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
The Home Secretary will host a ministerial meeting
in June 2005.
G8 Transnational crime and Counter-terror objectives
in 2005
The 2005 objectives combine work on the inherited agenda
and a number of new initiatives. There are nearly 100
separate projects. The key areas of work are:
- As lead country for counter-narcotics work in Afghanistan,
the UK will continue to seek co-ordination of the
G8 support for this work
- The completion of several initiatives to enhance
international travel security.
- International co-operation in combating immigration
crime, with an emphasis on document fraud.
- International law enforcement co-operation, focussing
on child protection, the expanded use of DNA and the
international illegal trade in firearms.
- International co-operation in combating high-tech
crime.
- Shared assessment of the threat from international
terrorism and co-operation to counter the treat.
- The reinforcement of the principles of judicial
co-operation and mutual legal assistance in the investigation
and prosecution of transnational organised crime and
terrorism.
Further information will be available soon and this
page will be updated accordingly.
If you would like to find out more about G8 please
visit the website at www.g8.gov.uk. |
