NEW YORK, Nov 3: With 10 to 15 million stolen passports in use around the world at the present time, the global struggle against terrorism is seriously hampered, Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble said.

It is imperative that all nations take the problem seriously, he said during a two-day visit here to inform the counter-terrorism committee of the UN Security Council of Interpol’s work since it opened an office at UN headquarters a year ago.

“If member countries treated stolen passports like citizens treat their stolen credit cards, then we would have many, many fewer terrorists and organized criminals in the world than we currently do,” Mr Noble said in an interview.

The council in late July called for greater UN-Interpol cooperation and urged member states to promptly inform Interpol of any passports and travel documents reported lost or stolen.

Noble said only 87 countries are participating in an Interpol computer data base on stolen passports, while 100 others remain undecided.

Since it was created three years ago when only 12 countries had signed on, he added, the data base has gone from 3,000 to more than eight million entries.

“Unless all countries share that information globally, the terrorists and organized criminals will be able to move from country to country,” Mr Noble said.

“We know that in the first World Trade Centre bombing in 1993, the person who did it, Ramzi Youssef, was in possession of a stolen Iraqi passport,” he said.

“We know that the prime minister of Serbia (Zoran Djindjic) was assassinated (in 2003) by someone carrying a stolen Croatian passport that had been stamped 26 times by six European countries and by Singapore,” Mr Noble said.

In cooperation with the United Nations, Interpol has sent three experts, including an analyst, to work with the investigation into the assassination of former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri in February, the Interpol chief said.—AFP