Grant Opportunity: Strengthening Thai Office of the Attorney General

The INL Thailand program has provided technical assistance to the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) with recent support that focused on combating trafficking in persons. The objective of this grant will be to expand this previous support into comprehensive and long-term institutional assistance that reaches a larger segment of the OAG.

The Office of the Attorney General (OAG) has approximately 3600-4000 prosecutors nationwide, with a few specialized units in Bangkok, including a special litigation unit (that covers transnational organized crime), a narcotics prosecution unit, and a trafficking in persons (TIP) litigation unit. The OAG is seeing increasing cases of narcotics, trafficking in persons, wildlife trafficking, fraud (via call centers), and cybercrime. While INL’s previous work with the OAG has focused primarily on TIP, the OAG would like to broaden its focus and work with the OAG to build both the foundational and specialized skills of prosecutors, both in Bangkok and in the provinces, in trial advocacy and specialized transnational crime cases, including narcotics trafficking, TIP, and continuing criminal enterprises. 

During the last several years, Thai government agencies, including the Office of the Attorney General and judiciary, have generally shown a limited willingness or capacity to work with the United States, and have been selective in the types of training that they will accept, which has generally focused on specialized topics such as TIP and cybercrime. INL Bangkok wants to move towards a comprehensive justice sector program that goes beyond ad hoc trainings and provides sustainable impact and engagement. This project is a critical part of INL’s overall justice sector program in Thailand and will further the goal of strengthening the Thai government’s capacity to counter crime, specifically transnational organized crime. 

PROJECT PURPOSE/DESCRIPTION

This project will build the foundational capacity of Thai prosecutors to more effectively and efficiently prosecute cases, as well as increase their capacity to prosecute complex cases, including, but not limited to, cases involving narcotics trafficking, TIP, and continuing criminal enterprises. The project will provide direct training to members of Thailand’s OAG and will establish training curricula/programs, as well as cadre of Thai trainers, in order to increase the OAG’s trial advocacy capability and their prosecutorial capacity to counter complex transnational crimes.