President Ma meets Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime Executive Director and Co-Chairman Barry A. K. Rider
President Ma Ying-jeou had a meeting on the afternoon of June 25 with Professor Barry A. K. Rider, who’s the executive director and co-chairman of the Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime. He thanked Professor Rider for his long-time help in connecting Taiwan’s law enforcement with international groups and expressed hope that ties between Taiwan and the UK will keep getting stronger.
During the talk, the president pointed out that since 1970, Professor Rider has worked closely with Taiwan’s Ministry of Justice, Investigation Bureau, prosecutors, and financial sector players, visiting Taiwan more than 30 times. Professor Rider is well respected academically and has advised big organizations like INTERPOL , IMF , World Bank , and Asian Development Bank. He’s known well both in British legal circles and globally.
President Ma also noted that Professor Rider started the Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime back in 1983. Since then, they’ve held 33 meetings annually focusing on economic crime-a topic countries everywhere care about deeply-and these gatherings really address what participants need practically. More than a thousand law enforcers, scholars, and experts from all over attend every year. In addition to this work, Professor Rider was elected to the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies in 1975-a group including folks like former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair , top members of Britain’s House of Lords appellate committee, senior legal officials, plus all US Supreme Court justices-which shows how significant his contributions are in this field.
When it comes to helping Taiwan’s agencies join international bodies, President Ma highlighted how Professor Rider helped ROC representatives attend over 20 conferences organized by the Cambridge symposium while maintaining close ties throughout. Also when he worked as a senior official at the Commonwealth Secretariat , he supported Taiwan’s National Police Agency getting involved with the International Association of Airport and Seaport Police. Besides all this formal stuff, he’s been an informal advisor to Taiwan’s UK office for years, offering lots of help.
The president went on to share some progress Taiwan has made fighting crime lately. He said that back in 2007-the year before he became president-there were more than 490,000 reported crimes nationwide with a clearance rate around 75%. After several years pushing hard against crime, last year saw only about 300,000 cases reported but an improved clearance rate up at 86%. That means crimes dropped by almost 38% since ’07 while solved cases rose by over eleven percent! Violent crimes dropped drastically-by three quarters-and thefts decreased nearly seventy percent too. Both categories not only had fewer cases but also much higher rates of resolution according to him.
He also talked about efforts against scams and boosting public safety overall. Scam losses peaked at NT$18.6 billion in 2006 but fell down dramatically to NT$3.3 billion last year-that’s an eighty-two percent drop! On top of that there was a survey done among American Chamber of Commerce members here showing Taiwan jumped into second place over five years under “my family feels safe.” The president said this shows how much people abroad recognize how safe Taiwan really is.
Ma believes one big reason public safety got better is because in 2009 they signed a Cross-Strait Joint Crime-Fighting and Judicial Mutual Assistance Agreement. Most criminals fleeing from here to mainland China have been sent back because of it – even some who ran off to Southeast Asia got caught thanks to cooperation across regions. He gave an example from April 2013 when bombs were planted on a high-speed train here – police identified suspects within one day then caught them within five days after they’d fled mainland China – something impossible before those agreements existed! As of March this year cross-strait teamwork cracked ninety-nine major cases capturing more than six thousand criminals altogether.
Lastly President Ma mentioned a case involving Zain Taj Dean , a British guy who caused a hit-and-run here while drunk driving then tried escaping justice by leaving Taiwan. In response during 2013 both sides signed an extradition agreement specifically for Dean which set new ground for judicial cooperation between their countries; they’re still working hard now trying to get him back so he can serve time here.
