The Afghanistan National Police (ANP)

[davidbfpo]

The Afghan police charged with maintaining security in their own country as coalition troops begin to pull out within months are still "endemically corrupt" and riven with problems including nepotism and drug abuse, internal government documents have revealed.

Foreign Office (FCO) papers obtained by The Independent on Sunday disclose official concerns about the fate of Afghanistan and its chances of holding the Taliban at bay, if its leaders fail to "root out corruption" throughout the ranks of the Afghan National Police (ANP).

A confidential report on the performance of the Afghan Uniform Police (AUP), the nation's major law-enforcement body, observed in October: "Unless radical change is introduced to improve the actual and perceived integrity and legitimacy of officers within the AUP, then the organisation will continue to provide an ineffective and tainted service to citizens … for decades to come."

Salutary reminder of the realities crept in, not from the FCO paper(s) methinks:

ANP officers, who are usually at the front line of the security forces' dealings with the public, have to endure lower pay and fatality rates twice as high as their counterparts in the Afghan army.

What a surprise! Must have been to the FCO, not the Afghan public.

Link:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...e-8430111.html

[davidbfpo]

The ANP have not gone away, but maybe before they do Hurst have published 'Policing Afghanistan: The Politics of the Lame Leviathan' by Antonio Giustozzi and Mohammed Isaqzadeh.

The publishers blurb:

This book is a rare in-depth study of a police force in a developing country which is also undergoing a bitter internal conflict, further to the post-2001 external intervention in Afghanistan. Policing Afghanistan discusses the evolution of the country’s police through its various stages but focuses in particular on the last decade.

The authors review the ongoing debates over the future shape of Afghanistan’s police, but seek primarily to analyse the way Afghanistan is policed relative to its existing social, political and international constraints. Giustozzi and Isaqzadeh have observed the development of the police force from its early stages, starting from what was a rudimentary, militia-based police force prior to 2001. This is a book about how the police really work in such a difficult environment, the nuts and bolts approach, based on first hand research, as opposed to a description of how the Afghan police are institutionally organised and regulated.

A review by a British academic, Alice Hills:

This is the first serious, comprehensive and convincing account of how policing in Afghanistan really works. Giustozzi and Isaqzadeh’s impressive study of the political dynamics of Afghan policing extends the police-studies agenda and is essential reading for anyone interested in the political economy – or reform – of policing.

Usual price 47 UK Pounds, currently special offer 35 UK Pounds; hardback, 240 pgs.

[davidbfpo]

Hardly a surprising headline for a BBC TV Panorama programme being broadcast tonight, Afghan police accused of corruption and child abuse is a report by Ben Anderson, whose documentaries are always excellent:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-21547542

Citing USMC Major Steuber, an ANP adviser:

Try doing that day in, day out, working with child molesters, working with people who are robbing people, murdering them. It wears on you after a while.

Ben Anderson's final comment says it all:

...from what I saw, corruption and criminality are widespread among the police in Sangin. This is exactly the kind of behaviour that led many Afghans to welcome the Taliban when they swept to power in 1996. Is this what all the fighting and bloodshed has been for?