Police face huge training challenges in Afghanistan

http://www.aftenposten.no/english/ ^

[marthemaria]

Norwegian police, who have been trying for the past five years to help Afghanistan build up its own police force, have issued a report that suggests they're dealing with chaotic conditions involving sex, drugs, corruption and defectors to the Taliban. Newly trained Afghan police photographed after a 10-day course in Kabul.

Norwegian police officer Per Dalland (right) during a training mission in Afghanistan.

Newspaper Aftenposten obtained a copy of the Norwegian police's own report on their efforts, and it reveals the challenges they face:

In July, while Norwegian police were training instructors for the border police unit, an Afghan officer took two police cars and nine colleagues and defected to the Taliban, signing on with a local Taliban leader.

Drug tests performed on Afghan police undergoing training showed that 95 percent of them tested positive for cannabis and amphetamines.

The police were supposed to have destroyed 50,000 hectares of opium production, but only 4,300 were destroyed during the season.

Female Afghan police officers are the targets of sexual attacks by their superiors.

Afghan police are believed to be setting free persons arrested on narcotics offenses, probably in return for bribes.

"This is all, of course, very unfortunate," the section chief for international police cooperation in Norway's police directorate, Torgrim Moseby, told newspaper Aftenposten. "But it's not surprising.

He said that many of those recruited for police work in Afghanistan have ties to old field marshalls who support the Taliban. British police have said that police training camps function more like rehabilitation centers, and that drugs are a huge problem.

Norway has contributed NOK 48 million to the police training program. "These examples just show that we have no choice but to continue our contribution towards strengtheing police reform in Afghanistan, to shape democracy and safety," Moseby said. Anita Nergård of the Foreign Ministry agreed.

"We see that the Afghan police are in a very difficult position," she said. "The need for international aid is huge."

[sinanju]

No two ways about it, the Afghans are failing to step up.

I recall that NYT story by the former administration official who worked on Afghan drug eradication. It isn’t happening and aerial defoliation is a workable solution. He wrote that the defoliants for the job would not be monstrously toxic and quite effective.

[sinanju]

The old “getting high on your own supply” phenomenon. Heroin rots the people who grow it just as inevitably as the people who buy it. Afghanistan has never grown poppy in anywhere near current amounts at any point in it’s history. And it’s destroying them.

[thefactor]

you can call these savages “Amish” for all i care. but they will never stop being savages. and they will never be cops.

[yankeedame]

"We see that the Afghan police are in a very difficult position," she said. "The need for international aid is huge."

And there we are, folks, "follow the money". What's that old saying? "You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink"? Likewise, you can throw all the money in the world at this Afghan "police" but if they don't want to change, they're not going to.

And, heck, why should they? They're making out like bandits -- literally: drawing a government pay check, are given hi-tech guns & taught how to use them, get a snazzy uniform, cars, get to openly push people around....

Norway has contributed NOK 48 million to the police training program.....

Typical liberal do-goodism. What a hoot! What did these Norwegians think? That they were going to turn 10th century-type tribes with a violent 8th century religion into 1960-style British bobbies?