[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 40, Number 9 (Monday, March 1, 2004)]
[Page 271]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Message to the Senate Transmitting the United Nations Convention Against 
Transnational Organized Crime and Two Supplementary Protocols

February 23, 2003

To the Senate of the United States:

    With a view to receiving the advice and consent of the Senate to 
ratification, I transmit herewith the United Nations Convention Against 
Transnational Organized Crime (the ``Convention''), as well as two 
supplementary protocols: (1) the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and 
Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, and (2) 
the Protocol Against Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, which 
were adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on November 15, 
2000. The Convention and Protocols were signed by the United States on 
December 13, 2000, at Palermo, Italy.
    Accompanying the Convention and Protocols are interpretative notes 
for the official records (or ``travaux preparatoires'') that were 
prepared by the Secretariat of the Ad Hoc Committee that conducted the 
negotiations, based on discussions that took place throughout the 
process of negotiations. These notes are being submitted to the Senate 
for information purposes. I also transmit the report of the Department 
of State with respect to the Convention and Protocols.
    The Convention and Protocols are the first multilateral treaties to 
address the phenomenon of transnational organized crime. Their 
provisions are explained in the accompanying report of the Department of 
State. The report also sets forth proposed reservations and 
understandings that would be deposited by the United States with its 
instruments of ratification. With these reservations and understandings, 
the Convention and Protocols will not require implementing legislation 
for the United States.
    The Convention and Protocols will be effective tools to assist in 
the global effort to combat transnational organized crime in its many 
forms, such as trafficking and smuggling of persons. They provide for a 
broad range of cooperation, including extradition, mutual legal 
assistance, and measures regarding property, in relation to serious 
crimes committed by an organized group that has a transnational element.
    The Convention also imposes on the States Parties an obligation to 
criminalize, if they have not already done so, certain types of conduct 
characteristic of transnational organized crime. For the Convention, 
these are: participation in an organized criminal group (i.e., 
conspiracy), money laundering, bribery of domestic public officials, and 
obstruction of justice. The Protocols require parties to criminalize 
trafficking in persons and smuggling of migrants. These provisions will 
serve to create a global criminal law standard for these offenses, 
several of which (e.g., trafficking in persons) currently are not 
criminal in many countries. The Trafficking Protocol also includes 
important provisions regarding assistance to and protection of victims 
of trafficking.
    I recommend that the Senate give early and favorable consideration 
to the Convention and Protocols, and that it give its advice and consent 
to ratification, subject to the reservations and understandings 
described in the accompanying report of the Department of State.
                                                George W. Bush
 The White House,
 February 23, 2004.