 Ladies and gentlemen dear colleagues, thank you for being here today and thank you to Interpol for inviting me to address this Pretty important Practitionist forum. I would like to take this opportunity to focus my presentation on the 10 years of existence of the ICC and Mainly on what we have learned in those 10 years The efforts of the prosecutor of the ICC has evolved a lot during that time period Having created an office from scratch. It is now investigating in seven different countries Having developed 15 cases against 27 defendants Three cases have already reached trial stage and two of them have already finished in 2012 and the court has announced its first Conviction in March of this year Simultaneously, we're looking into opening new situations and of course working on new warrants of arrest But in those 10 years we've learned a lot on how to investigate in conflict areas without exposing staff, witnesses Or our own or victims to any risks that we cannot manage The evidence skates quite a lot of experience also in how to deal with traumatized witnesses witnesses who very often do not understand the concept of law or do not understand the necessity to come to trial and testify in court But this learning curve over these 10 years With positive and negative experiences has in the end resulted in an operational manual that captures our Investigative strategies But we're constantly improving that manual basically and one of our strategic goals is to think about how we can share with partners Our standards of international Investigations, and I was very pleased to hear that my friend and colleague Sergio Bramers has already put together the experience of data tribunal So I will be very interested in reading that experience I'm certain a lot of that will be of good use not only to the ICC but to our community as a whole However, the single most important thing that we've learned is that the office of the procedure and the ICC more generally Cannot operate on its own and nor can it achieve justice for victims on its own For the ATP to be successful It needs to sit within a network of real partnership which promotes high-quality Investigations at the ICC but also supports the prosecutions and investigations Conducted at a domestic level And let me share you with you some of the reasons why I think corporations is of such importance to all of us First of all, the ATP is well aware of a well-known lesson Lesson well known to all the investigations, which is the golden hour It's the actions of the first respondents in that golden hour, which can easily shape the success or failure of an investigation when first responders acts proactively and effectively in those first days after an incidence Their actions can be of user benefit to the ATP investigators at a later stage Because due to its jurisdiction limitations due to its protection obligations and due to cooperation requirements Rarely the OTB will be able to act as a first responder in the crimes within the ICC jurisdiction Therefore, it needs to cooperate with first responders It needs to help them to make certain in advance that the first responses are of a high quality and Up to the required legal standards to be admissible as evidence in court and that we share the information That is being carried in an effective way I personally believe that more can be done in this field of interaction between first responders and the ICC Just like in any international investigation After the flurry of initial activities It's important to sit down and to take stock and work out who went to the crime scene Who spoke to witnesses who get financial data who had access to telephone information who had access to email data, etc if we're not able to come together and share that information we will end up in a situation where One of us has a suspect available one of us has victims available Another one of us will have physical evidence available But none of us are combining the information that will really lead to prosecution and a successful trial in court secondly Conflicts zones seem quite remote from where one usually operates in a national jurisdiction However, those conflicts are real in reality closer than one could imagine people from those areas Would it be victims? Be witnesses or perpetrators traveled to our countries and these population movements are a huge investigative opportunity to us as an investigative community and They are untainted by the witness security issues which normally arise when you try to interview witnesses in conflict areas For example, using example of Cote d'Ivoire, which is a situation under investigation before the ICC Asylum seekers from Cote d'Ivoire have increased from 1500 in 2010 to 5400 in 2011 taking another example taking the example of Libya There were almost 2,900 asylum seekers in the 27 EU countries This is an enormous wealth of information and we have to figure out how we can make better use of such resource Thirdly, why is comparison important? Well, ICC suspects act to obtain our and or sustain the control of financially lucrative resources or positions of authority For that purpose, they need to maintain the support networks and At the same time fund their ongoing conflicts and in doing so they engage themselves in a wide spectrum of International criminality to which my colleague said they also made reference To fill themselves they embezzled public funds and or conduct a variety of very lucrative criminal activities arms dealing drugs trafficking human trafficking smuggling of minerals and precious metals They also operate in politically unstable areas With a poor infrastructure and a low social and economic development Which obliges them to move their financial resources to external financial markets and in particular offshore jurisdictions which provide them safe haven from where their assets will be managed and find they need to obtain the necessary means arms Soldiers high technology equipment and in order to acquire this they need connections with our perpetrators with criminal and terrorist organizations and networks both at a national and international level Finally cooperation is important because conflicts situations and areas of Themselves create a marketplace for a range of other criminals drug and human traffickers feed of corruption and route their products through failed states Terrorists recruits in refugee camps and take funds through illicit resource trading in diamonds and gold Criminals obtain training and weapons in failed states our traffickers reach sanctions to access high-end top-end crisis There is as you can see a clear connection between organized crime and ICC crimes and In order to fight organized crime at your front there You need to look into its links to conflict areas and repressive regimes all those reasons I've mentioned I think our reasons why we should really see us to consider how we can improve cooperation so to conclude Our past our present and our future as practitioners in the air of crime is cooperation And we need to ask ourselves the following questions Do we have a platform to share information about crimes against humanity war crimes and genocide? Do we have a platform that identifies synergies in our investigations? How do I know what I should share? With you and what you might have for me Are we making the best use of each other's experience and expertise and do we have a common set of standards? Which will allow us and facilitate the interaction between us much more But thinking about cooperation. We also need to think less conservatively We should not restrict our concept of cooperation only to ourselves But also think about interaction with other partners With NGOs and the media because they are also first responders With technology companies so that we can access new technologies to strengthen our investigations and increase our access to victims and witnesses Let me finish my introductory remarks by stating that I hope that this conference is a decisive step To boost our cooperation relations between the ICC between Interpol National authorities and other partners. I think once again the organization and Interpol in particular for their kind invitation. Thank you