Interpol Red Notices Damage Reputations: How to Recover.

Interpol Red Notice reports have a devastating effect on people’s lives. Victims can lose their visa status, employment, security clearance and their freedom while being perceived as criminal “fugitives”.

Interpol “fugitives” are perceived to be guilty even though no due process or investigation occurs at the time a Notice is activated and disputing a Notice is nothing like a courtroom. Even once an application to delete a wrongful Notice has been made, the decision is ultimately made behind closed doors and appealing an unfavourable decision is extremely difficult.

A number of countries have exploited the organisation, misusing it for political persecutions, human rights abuses or debt collection. Business owners have notoriously used the tool as a means to extort victims or loot corporate assets and prevent their former partners from taking action. Whether it’s a Sheikh, a government, a bank or a corporation, Interpol has left itself open to abuse and there are no consequences for anyone other than the victim.

I lost my business and my clients after my name was splattered all over

the media -

The real world consequences are endless.

Even after surviving the risk of arrest and extradition and successfully deleting a Red Notice, the damage done to a person’s career and reputation can be permanent. “Even when the Notice is removed, I will never be able to work in this industry again”?is a common complaint amongst those in security or finance. “I lost my business and my clients after my name was splattered all over the media”,?an issue for businessmen who were publicly branded criminals after opponents leaked news of their fugitive status. Some victims have struggled to keep their immigration status or obtain visas. Expert Radha Stirling explains “I am regularly required to provide expert testimony for immigration and asylum applications to prove the Interpol Red Notice should not be a factor in decision making and that the individual may face human rights abuses if asylum is denied”.

In cases where a victim has suffered a barrage of negative media coverage, it’s important to set the record straight. Stirling, an expert with more than 12 years experience, founded IPEX (Interpol & Extradition) Reform and Due Process International (DPI). “The organisations help victims of Interpol abuse to delete their names from the database, support any crossfire issues like visas and immigration and to restore reputations damaged by this abuse of process”.

When a Sheikh, the FBI or a contentious former business partner uses Interpol and the media to crush their opponent, their target faces a completely unique crisis that can have permanent repercussions in every area of their lives. Stirling and her team have confronted these issues head on for high profile business leaders facing reputational ruin. “We have used every tool at our disposal to ensure our clients have won in court and in the media. This has entailed everything from creating websites for our clients, ensuring international media coverage, creating podcasts and opening lawsuits against powerful opponents. We are now preparing a class action against Interpol themselves.”

Victims now know they can get their lives and reputations back.

See our Interpol Abuse Press Pack:

About IPEX Reform:

Established by Radha Stirling, founder and CEO of Detained in Dubai, and a leading voice against Interpol abuse, Interpol and Extradition Reform (IPEX) is a comprehensive initiative to address the widespread and multilayered problems with the current framework of the extradition process, including the many flaws in Interpol itself as an organisation.?Radha Stirling has successfully lobbied Australian Parliament to include human rights provisions in their extradition treaty with the UAE, appeared for the defence as an expert witness in several high profile extradition cases and has worked tirelessly to remove wrongfully listed clients from Interpol’s database. She has led the call for greater Interpol transparency and reforms to end abuse by an emerging “authoritarian nexus” which misuses the Interpol Red Notice system to circumvent due process.?

IPEX demands that Interpol implement practical measures to ensure the protection of refugees from politically motivated malicious extradition requests, including the establishment of data sharing agreements with the UNHCR and national governments so that individuals who have been granted asylum will not be put at risk of extradition to the countries from which they have fled.?This proposal is currently supported by prominent barristers in the United Kingdom, human rights organisations, and activists.

Furthermore, IPEX suggests core reforms to state-to-state extradition requests and Interpol protocols to ensure these processes will not be used for political persecution, extortion of debtors, and in an attempt to circumvent international standards of due process by instituting a global criteria for the consideration of extradition requests which include human rights concerns and the integrity of national legal systems.