Melodie rescue boost for Interpol meeting

Press, 23 November 1987, Page 8

Melodie rescue boost for Interpol meeting

NZPA-Reuter Paris The rescue of Melodie Nakachian and the capture of her kidnappers has given a shot in the

arm to cross-border police work on the eve of an Interpol conference, where international gangsters are the top target. Spanish police stormed a Costa del Sol villa on

Friday and freed the five-year-old girl unharmed. They arrested two Frenchmen and two Spaniards.

The subsequent capture in Paris of five other suspects, two of them known criminals, exposed an international conspiracy and put another feather in the cap of French and Spanish police, who collaborated in cracking the 12-day kidnap case. Interpol, the 142-nation crime-busting organisation which opens its week-long annual conference in Nice tomorrow, could hardly have asked for a better advertisement than the capture of a gang of nine by two national police forces working together. Melodie’s kidnappers had threatened to kill her or starve her to death unless her millionaire

Lebanese-born father paid a ransom which was initially set at $l3 million and later lowered to $2 million.

An Interpol spokesman, Miguel Chamorro, of Spain, said the 500 senior police delegates planned to tackle the growing problem of international organised crime.

In the 12-nation European Community, relaxed border controls have made it easier for criminals to move about.

A new , (West Germandesigned computerised data collating system, in use for just three months, has greatly increased the speed at which Interpol can build up files on criminals known to more than one police force. French police, in cooperation with Spain, last month carried out raids on suspected Basque guerrillas in southern France, but Interpol, whose statute prohibits involvement in political or religious areas, has made little headway in co-ordinating the war against international terrorism. Its members, among them Libya, do not always see eye to eye on the issue.