UN calls for broader laws

       Thailand and Laos are being urged by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime to pass wide-ranging laws that would be more effective in cracking down on transnational organised crime.
       The countries' existing laws could only deal with members of gangs, not the leaders, directors or financiers of organised crime groups, said Andreas Schloenhardt, a legal expert from the University of Queensland and the author of the UNODC report on organised crime offences in Asia and the Pacific region.
       The report was launched in Bangkok yesterday.
       Thailand's criminal law contains no specific provisions associated with criminal organisations, he said.
       Thailand and Laos have signed the Convention against Transnational Organised Crime, better known as the Palermo Convention, but have yet to issue domestic laws to put the pact into practice.
       Other Asian parties to the convention such as Singapore, China, Hong Kong,Japan, Korea and Vietnam have been taking some full-fledged follow-up actions, he said.
       "It is understood that Thailand has its own domestic political concerns so the issue of tackling the organised crime gangs through these laws have yet to be given a high priority," Mr Schloenhardt said.
       Thailand should enact new laws that are more effective at preventing and suppressing organised crime as its present laws were not comprehensive enough to criminalise organised crime, he said.
       Its ability to tackle transnational organised crime was being hindered by an obscure definition of "organised crime" and the lack of legal provisions to indict those involved in an act of conspiracy in serious crimes.
       Mr Schloenhardt warned that any definition of a "criminal organisation" must not be used as a pretext to eliminate political rivals or outlaw social groups or organisations that pursue religious and ideological causes.
       UNODC regional representative Gary Lewis said regional cooperation and a stronger effort to implement the Palermo Convention were needed to prevent organised criminal groups from "jurisdiction shopping" for countries with little in the way of coordinated response and constraints on domestic law enforcement.