Afghan police and prosecutors get training in Finland

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About 20 Afghan men and two women listen as Ilpo Kortelainen of the North Savo police force explains how it is possible for a perpetrator and a victim in a case of theft to settle their differences without having to go through a difficult trial.
      There were many questions and answers at the lecture held at the Crisis Management Centre in Kuopio, keeping interpreter Hemad Jamehdarian busy.
     
The listeners were police and prosecution officials from Afghanistan, who came to Finland for two weeks to learn about how their Finnish colleagues work. The focus is on cooperation between the police and prosecutors in the investigation of crimes.
      The aim of the course is to promote more efficient investigation of crimes in Afghanistan, and to increase the citizens’ protection under the law. The course is organised by the Crisis Management Centre in cooperation with EUPOL, the EU Police Mission in Afghanistan.
      “We are not offering our model to be copied. It would not work there. We give ideas and thoughts on how they could develop their own activities”, says Jari Lehvonen, planner of training at the Crisis Management Centre.
     
On the basis of the course, the group will produce a handbook on police-prosecutor cooperation that is applicable to the conditions that prevail in Afghanistan. It is to be used in the training of police and lawyers.
      “Over there, the chain formed by police, prosecutors, and the courts is in a deep swamp. The people do not have confidence in it. This is one way to lift the chain out of the swamp”, says Pekka Kokkonen, who works with EUPOL in Afghanistan.
     
The idea for the training came to Jari Paajala, the legal advisor of EUPOL, when he saw the conditions in which his Afghani colleagues were working.
      “People need new material to get beyond mutual recrimination. Finland could be a good example”, he says.
     
Ravaged by war, and suffering from a lack of security, Afghanistan is trying to build its society with the help of the international community.
      Of the country’s 96,000 police officers, 70 per cent cannot read. Many of the applicants for police training fail drug tests. Corruption is commonplace among both police and prosecutors.
      According to Haider Basrin, deputy minister at Afghanistan’s Ministry of the Interior, the country’s police are in the midst of great changes. Education is the key word.
      “We have built police training centres, where police skills can be raised, and where they can also be taught basic skills, such as how to read”, Basir says.
     
Police and prosecutors do not generally work together in Afghanistan, even though legislation would allow closer cooperation.
      In spite of the differences between two countries, the participants in the course believe that they can apply what they learned in Finland to conditions in their own country.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Finnish police pinned down during Kabul attack (19.1.2010)

Links:
  EUPOL Afghanistan

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