Indonesian prosecutor urges ASEAN members to work with China to fight transnational crimes

Countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) need to enhance technological cooperation with China to combat transnational financial crimes in the digital age, an Indonesian senior prosecutor told China Daily.

“China is already one of the biggest countries in the field of technology and internet, so ASEAN countries need to work together with China hand in hand to combat crime,” said R Narendra Jatna, Indonesia’s deputy attorney general for civil and administrative affairs.

Money laundering and corruption crimes are conducted by using technology, making it necessary for prosecution authorities to also adopt more innovative anti-crime methods, he said.

Jatna was attending the 15th China-ASEAN Prosecutors-General Conference held in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region from Sept 22 to 24.

Initiated by the Supreme People's Procuratorate of the People's Republic of China in 2004, the conference this year brought together around 80 high-level delegations from across the region to discuss the topic “Combating Money Laundering and Corruption, and Recovering Assets in the Technological Age”.

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With growing business and investment exchanges between China and Indonesia, Jatna expressed hope that the two countries would strengthen cooperation in the legal sector to support the smooth operation of business activities.

“Now we have around 14 prosecutors studying on the Chinese mainland,” he said.  “It is a good opportunity for our prosecutors to have an understanding (of China), not only by the textbook, but also in culture.”

Having attended the conference’s previous editions in Singapore and Hanoi, Jatna said the event in Hong Kong is very special because it demonstrates the uniqueness of the practice of “one country, two systems”, which allows the city to have a different legal system from the Chinese mainland.

This has provided Hong Kong with a better opportunity to serve as a bridge between the Chinese mainland and other ASEAN countries, said Jatna.

Contact the writer at kelly@chinadailyapac.com