Organized criminals have for decades used the U.S.-Mexican border to elude law enforcement. By committing crimes in one country and taking refuge in the other, they have often obstructed both investigations and prosecutions.

That longstanding tactic, however, is being taken away.

A three-day forum in Phoenix this week, attended by 25 attorneys general from U.S. and Mexican states, produced substantial agreements to work together in the fight against organized crime. These crimes include human smuggling, drug smuggling, arms trafficking and money laundering -- all committed by criminals adept at working both sides of the border.

Our press release described these agreements as marking "a new era of binational cooperation to fight organized crime."

That is no exaggeration. The attorneys general agreed to develop joint investigative operations, to expand joint undercover efforts, to share more criminal information and widen the use of proven investigative techniques. Some of these techniques have been developed in Arizona, such as cutting-edge procedures used in money laundering investigations and our THEFTAZ database, which provides timely information about stolen vehicles to law enforcement on both sides of the border.

Of no less importance, we agreed to broaden the use of a legal provision in the Mexican criminal code that provides the ability to investigate and prosecute criminals operating in both countries. This change will remove what has at times been a major legal impediment to effective binational investigations.

Taken together, these agreements will go a long way toward knocking down the border as a barrier to law enforcement.

This week's conference built on progress made last fall at a meeting of the Conference of Western Attorneys General with our Mexican counterparts in Cuernavaca, Mexico. The earlier meeting increased mutual trust and laid the groundwork for the agreements that were adopted this week's forum.

Terry Goddard