Kabul: When the Taliban engineered a prison break in the southern city of Kandahar in June, nearly 900 inmates escaped but not a single one had been fingerprinted or photographed.

Though foreign militants are flowing into Afghanistan from Pakistan, Iran and Chechnya, authorities often do not track them with fingerprints and photos. And even when they do, they are not always able transfer the documentation to international databases.

Interpol now hopes to bring Afghanistan up to international standards.

The international police organisation wants to boost police capabilities here with equipment and training, and help connect police around the country with the Interior Ministry headquarters in Kabul.

"When you look around the world, where was the largest prison escape of terrorists in the world? Afghanistan," Interpol Secretary General Ronald K Noble said on a recent visit. "Where do people believe the fighters from Iraq are moving? Afghanistan. Where have the al-Qaeda and Taliban shown a resurgence that should catch all of our attention? It s in Afghanistan."

The initiative could help alert police around the world when their wanted criminals are captured in the Afghan-Pakistan region.

An increasing number of terror plots meant to be unleashed in Europe are being traced back to Pakistan s tribal areas near the Afghan border, where militants get training and weapons supplies and cross into Afghanistan for attacks.

Currently, no Afghan police offices in the country s 34 provinces can take fingerprints and send them to Kabul to be entered into international databases, said B S Sardar Awa, the head of Afghanistan s Interpol office. Police in Kabul are able to submit information to Interpol.
Source : PTI