Spain and Mexico sign bilateral partnership agreement with status of international treaty on efforts to combat organised crime

The Minister for Home Affairs, Jorge Fernández Díaz, explained that this agreement also provides for the creation of a Joint Committee that, at a technical level, will comprise the heads of each department in this area with a view to fostering joint cooperation and collaboration. The agreement not only covers the fight against organised crime but also includes other issues in the field of home affairs, such as terrorism, people trafficking, the fight against drug and explosive trafficking, and police cooperation in terms of training the Mexican Judicial Police.

Jorge Fernández Díaz told Jesús Murillo that the Spanish Ministry of Home Affairs is studying the text of the Bilateral Agreement between the Mexican Ministry of the Interior and the Spanish Ministry of Home Affairs aimed at establishing a procedure on international documentation and transit for expelled or repatriated individuals from Mexican or Spanish territory with a final destination in a third State, with a view to it being signed in the future.

Collaboration on the fight against ETA terrorism

At their meeting, Jorge Fernández Díaz thanked the Government of Mexico for its collaboration on the fight against ETA and the hand-over to the Spanish authorities of members of the terrorist group who had previously fled and were subsequently located in Mexico.

The Spanish Minister for Home Affairs highlighted the excellent cooperation that exists between the General Commissariat of Intelligence of the Spanish National Police Force and the Centre for National Investigation and Security (CISEN) of Mexico.

Cooperation on police training

Jorge Fernández Díaz told Jesús Murillo that, in terms of training the Spanish minister stressed that, "Mexico is a priority for my ministerial department", as demonstrated, , by "the participation of three Mexican civil servants - two of which come from the Office of the General Attorney of the Republic of Mexico - on the Advanced Training Course for the Executive Leadership of the National Police Force that will be taught at the National Police Academy in Ávila from 10 September 2014 to 26 June 2015. Representatives from the Mexican Security Forces also took part in various training activities in Spain on matters of illegal trafficking, terrorism and organised crime".

Jorge Fernández Díaz also stressed that last year the Spanish National Police Force developed the Vocational Training Programme of the Ministerial Federal Police of Mexico, a body managed under the Office of the General Attorney of the Republic of Mexico. As part of this training programme, the Spanish minister pointed out that the Spanish National Police Force taught 21 training courses to various units of the Ministerial Federal Police of Mexico - five of them in Spain and 16 of them in Mexico.