ABSTRACT. As one of the active participants in the Palermo system treaty making (from early Polish draft in 1988 to the Signing Conference in December 2000), I am revisiting, rethinking and summing up the first 10 years period after the creation of important international instruments on organized crime and corruption. This article is a brief assessment on the main institutions and instruments relevant to the universal criminal justice. A due reference is made to terrorism by elaborating on the phenomenon as well as on the key universal and regional institutions and instruments dealing with terrorism. The present article appeared for the first time in 1999 (in a considerably shorter form, as the working paper dealing only with the critical similarities and differences between ‘smuggling of’ and ‘trafficking in’) before the ICMPD Steering Board – Ministerial. pp. 119–154

Keywords: JHA, diplomacy, international regime, multilateral treaties, UNODC, universal criminal justice