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Objectives

AFRIPOL is committed to strengthening police cooperation across Africa. Our primary goals include combating organised transnational crime, terrorism, and cybercrime by developing and reinforcing law enforcement capacities. Discover how AFRIPOL aims to create a safer continent by collaborating with member states and providing essential resources to empower police forces in their crucial mission.

AFRIPOL aims to:

  • Establish a framework for police cooperation at the strategic, operational and tactical levels between African Union member state police institutions
  • Facilitate the prevention, detection and investigation of transnational organised crime in coordination and collaboration with national, regional and international police institutions
  • Develop member states’ police capacities through the establishment of African centres of excellence for targeted police training programmes adapted to the realities of the African context
  • Prepare a harmonised African strategy to fight against transnational organised crime, terrorism and cybercrime within the framework of the implementation of the relevant African Union policies
  • Improve coordination with similar structures in preventing and combating transnational organised crime
  • Assist member states’ police institutions in setting up a framework of cooperation for police institutions at national, regional, continental and international levels
  • Assist member states’ police institutions to improve their efficiency and effectiveness through the enhancement of their organisational, technical, strategic, operational and tactical capacities
  • Facilitate the exchange or sharing of information or intelligence to prevent and combat transnational organised crimes, terrorism and cybercrime
  • Prevent, detect and investigate transnational organised crime in cooperation and collaboration with national, regional and international police and law enforcement agencies
  • Assist member states to develop or improve good practices in governance and management of police institutions and respect for human and people’s rights
  • Assist member states to develop and improve community-based policing to encourage citizen involvement in preventing and combating crime
  • Support member states in developing a continental vision and strategies for coordination and collaboration among police institutions
  • Assist member states in developing common African positions on policy matters
  • Undertake studies on trends in transnational organised crimes and develop continental tools for crime prevention
  • Develop appropriate communication strategies, systems and databases for the fulfilment of the above functions.

Purpose and mandate

AFRIPOL is a technical institution of the African Union with a mandate to strengthen cooperation between the police agencies of AU member states in the prevention and fight against organized transnational crime, terrorism, and cybercrime. Its status was adopted by the AU Conference in January 2017 and became effective immediately.

The priority of AFRIPOL is to strengthen and harmonize the capacities of law enforcement agencies in member states and facilitate cooperation and collaboration among them in the prevention and fight against organized transnational crime.

To achieve this goal, AFRIPOL provides law enforcement agencies with online training via its e-learning platform, in-person training, training of trainers, experiences and best practices sharing workshops, immersion internships, as well as scholarships.

The African Secure Communication System “AFSECOM”, is a key tool for implementing the mandate of AFRIPOL. It ensures secure and reliable communication between AFRIPOL and law enforcement agencies of the African union member states, while allowing for the storage and sharing of data to enhance the cooperation between them in combating organized transnational crime, terrorism, and cybercrime. All AFRIPOL liaison offices are equipped with this system.

AFRIPOL maintains strong partnership with African regional police chief organizations as well as with CAERT and CISSA. It also cooperates with numerous international police organizations, such as INTERPOL, CEPOL, FRONTEX, EUROPOL, GCCPOL, and UNODC.

In 2020, INTERPOL and AFRIPOL established the support program for the African Union in relation to AFRIPOL (ISPA), offering both organizations the opportunity to cooperate in key areas, including combating criminal networks in organized crime, terrorism, and cybercrime. Since 2019, a cooperation project with the German Federal Police has been established, aimed at strengthening the capacities of law enforcement agencies in member states in key areas of their activities, particularly in forensic through the AFRIPOL Network of Excellence in Forensic.