McEntee attends Annual Cross Border Conference on Organised Crime

Helen McEntee

Speaking on the second day of the conference, held at the Farnham Estate in Co. Cavan, Ms McEntee thanked delegates for their commitment to working collaboratively to keep communities safe.

Speaking before the conference, Ms McEntee said: “North-South cooperation in policing and criminal justice is a significant priority for the Irish Government. Crime of course does not respect borders and it is essential that we continue to broaden and deepen the relationships to help us prevent this criminal activity.

“An Garda Síochána, the PSNI, and the various agencies represented around the table today, have built excellent working relationships and strong levels of cooperation over many years. This conference is a valuable opportunity to exchange learnings and devise shared solutions to shared challenges, to tackle serious crime and improve community safety north and south.

“Joint action continues to produce successful outcomes on an operational level and it sends a strong message to criminals that they will not evade justice.”

Ms McEntee also addressed the work being done to protect the common travel area. She said: “Having no physical border controls on the land border between Ireland and Northern Ireland was a key priority for the Government during Brexit negotiations but this does not mean that we can’t work together to disrupt any abuse of the Common Travel Area.

“It is a priority for the Government and the UK Government to ensure that the CTA is not abused by those not entitled to avail of it. There are a number of ongoing joint operations tackling these abuses by identifying illegal secondary movement patterns within the CTA and taking actions to disrupt such abuse.”