On Thursday January 19, 2023 the Ministers of Justice of Aruba, Curacao and Sint Maarten, who met
in Aruba in connection with the Four-party Judicial Consultation also referred to as the JVO (Justitieel
Vierpartijen Overleg), were invited by the Board of Police Chiefs (College van Korpschefs) of the
Caribbean countries in the Kingdom for an extensive presentation and discussion on the activities of
the Board.
The Board of Police Chiefs is a partnership between the police forces of Aruba, Curacao, Sint
Maarten, and the BES islands represented by their respective Chiefs of Police and supported by the
National Police of the Netherlands, in which the forces closely collaborate on and discuss matters of
common interest. The Board is chaired by each of its members in turn under a rotating
Chairmanship. The current Chair is Chief of Police of Sint Maarten Mr. Carl John.
During the presentation and discussion, Minister Tjon, Minister Hato and Minister Richardson were
updated on the activities that have been carried out in recent months at the request of the Board.
These activities have yielded positive results for the police forces. The activities have focused on
Information Cooperation between the countries and within the countries, whereby special attention
is placed amongst other things on improving analysis capacity in the forces and increasing the
effectiveness of working with information. In addition, the activities also place much attention on
General Education Programs for the police forces and how these can be further developed in the
region while also looking at organizing specialized training programs to further professionalize the
forces e.g. Leadership development programs. This will be carried out in collaboration with the local
training institutes in Curacao and Aruba with the support of the Netherlands Police Academy.
After informing the Ministers of Justice of the activities that have taken place, the Board informed
the Ministers of forthcoming projects. All three Ministers of Justice very much welcomed the
opportunity for this first meeting with the Board of Police Chiefs which they found to be quite
enlightening. Minister Richardson, supported by her colleague Ministers, expressed the hope that
this meeting would mark the beginning of a regular discussion forum between the Ministers and
Chiefs of Police to discuss common matters of importance. At the meeting with the Board of Police
Chiefs, the Ministers of Justice were introduced to a visiting delegation of the police force of the
Republic of Surinam. On behalf of their respective countries the Ministers of Justice conveyed the
sincere regards and best wishes for the new year to the people of Surinam.
