Crime was once a predominantly local phenomenon; criminals had little opportunity to rapidly distance themselves from their crimes by fleeing to other parts of the world. Today, however, modern transportation systems allow criminals to cross national borders and even take refuge in other nations. Organized crime has gone global, and its reach now spans across oceans and national borders. And because of the Internet, it is possible for a criminal and a victim to be separated by time zones and continents. When the roots of Interpol were established in the early 20th century, its founders could never have imagined such developments, but they knew that crime was becoming more international in scope and that an agency for coordinating international crime-fighting efforts was a necessity. Interpol chronicles, from its inception to the present, this agency's efforts to combat international crime.
