Australian Federal Police Commissioner Krissy Barrett will use this week’s INTERPOL General Assembly in Morocco to press police leaders from across the world to help stem illicit tobacco trafficking and share more intelligence on Nazi supporters and other groups undermining social cohesion.
Commissioner Barrett is meeting more than 20 law enforcement heads on the sidelines of the 93rd annual gathering, seeking deeper cooperation to disrupt offshore criminal networks targeting Australia. She will also reaffirm the AFP’s financial support for INTERPOL Project Blue Pacific, which expands access to Red Notices and other alerts for Pacific police agencies.
INTERPOL, she said, remains “an incredibly important strand in our national security framework,” particularly at a time when the global order is being tested by “grey zone warfare and outright aggression”. As some countries pull away from multilateral policing, she added, “the AFP will step up to ensure integrity and transparency remains in these forums.”
A major priority in Morocco will be tackling the illicit tobacco trade, which, she warned, is fuelling Australia’s “criminal ecosystems” and bankrolling other organised-crime ventures. Barrett said bilateral meetings and informal exchanges on the sidelines of the Assembly are “invaluable”, adding that she will urge Middle Eastern and Asian counterparts to “collaborate with the AFP more often and take symbiotic action in the interests of our countries”.
Barrett said her leadership would “supercharge” AFP activity offshore, with more deliberate and assertive use of international partnerships. With AFP officers permanently posted in more than 30 countries, she said Australia is well-placed to work closely with operational agencies abroad and “disrupt threats before they reach our borders”.
She will also ask partners to increase intelligence sharing on hate groups, including Nazi supporters, and to share lessons learned over decades of tackling extremism. “Safeguarding Australia’s social cohesion is a key priority,” she said. “The AFP will disrupt and act against offenders who damage our social fabric and create hatred, division and violence targeted at marginalised communities.”
Barrett warned that Australia’s ongoing demand for illicit commodities — even amid cost-of-living pressures — was placing “significant pressure in our suburbs” and driving organised crime to use Pacific transit routes. This, she said, was harming Pacific communities and attracting criminal networks into the region. She emphasised that the AFP would “stand side-by-side with Pacific police organisations”, ensuring they had access to global databases that help identify, track and remove offenders.
At the General Assembly, Barrett will join a high-profile panel on women in policing alongside Europol Executive Director Catherine De Bolle, Ghana Police Service Director-General Lydia Yaako Donkor, and Victor Manuel Garcia Giron from Panama’s National Central Bureau.
The AFP will also sign new Memorandums of Understanding with police organisations in the Maldives, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Sri Lanka to strengthen the fight against transnational crime.
Across the week, Barrett will meet INTERPOL Secretary General Valdecy Urquiza and senior officials from Five Eyes partners, Europol, France, Germany, India, Japan, Kenya, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Tunisia, and several Pacific nations, among others. More than 160 countries are attending this year’s session.
Barrett stressed the importance of focusing on threats to vulnerable communities, especially children. The AFP is intensifying efforts to target online crime networks involved in youth radicalisation, sextortion, online child exploitation and groups that glorify criminality. Australia is the third-largest contributor of INTERPOL Green Notices — most concerning convicted child sex offenders who may reoffend overseas.
The AFP will also back South Korea’s push to dismantle transnational scam centres and continue its collaboration with Italy and other partners on Silver Notices, which trace and recover criminal assets across borders. As of October 2025, AFP-INTERPOL cooperation has assessed 119 Silver Notices from 28 countries, identifying more than $55 million in assets and transactions linked to Australia. The AFP has now issued its first Silver Notice targeting assets of an accused illicit-tobacco trafficker.
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