Police oversight and accountability is key to building trust and confidence Kabul, January 2015. EUPOL’s revised mandate is to influence the move to a civilian policing service underpinned by principles of Human Rights, Gender and the Rule of Law. Central to any civilian policing model is the need for the public to have confidence in an independent police oversight mechanism, which has the ability to hold the police and justice sectors to account. For citizens, it is vital that the police are legitimate through their actions and behaviour. Any instances of corruption, or the abuse of human rights whilst suspects are in police custody for example, undermine trust and confidence and deny individuals justice and basic human rights. This has led EUPOL to provide advice at the strategic level, to the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) and to facilitate meetings to progress their work and the Office of The Police Ombudsman (OPO). This includes support to the on-going discussions with the Ministry of the interior, regarding new Terms of Reference, which are designed to afford better access for OPO staff to detention facilities and police stations, so that they can inspect and report on any issues they find. During a recent meeting between the AIHRC, the Afghan Ministry of Interior (MoI), EUPOL and military prosecutors, decisions were made to implement three important tasks in the future. First, better cooperation in supervising the detention centres. Second, responding to complaints to make sure there aren’t Human Rights violations and third, sharing information and a following up on any complaints. The Chairman of AIHRC, Mr. Ayoub Aseel stated during the meeting that AIHRC and the MoI are together in their goals and there should be close cooperation between these two institutions. “After the transition, we realised there is a need for cooperation with the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) when it comes to complaints and human rights violation issues. We are human beings, among the security forces there are violations of human rights the same as everywhere else. Therefore, we need to cooperate with each other.” The primary objectives of this project are to ensure better protection for the rights of the public and police officers, in order to increase public trust and confidence in the police complaints system in Afghanistan. This will be achieved through maintaining an independent and effective police oversight mechanism together with the handling of serious complaints and allegations of police misconduct, human rights violations and corruption cases, as well as dealing with complaints from people who are not satisfied with the way police have dealt with their complaints. Support to police oversight and accountability revolves around the Office of the Police Ombudsman in the AIHRC, and the objective is to enhance the investigation of serious human rights abuses by the police. Naqibullah Bashari, Head of Office of Police Ombudsman (OPP) in AIHRC said: “Those whose rights are violated should be given a chance to talk to us. Of course their confidentiality will be taken into consideration.” Adding how the complaints procedure would work: “The complaints are about police, prosecutors and military. They are posted on our website or we receive phone calls. According to the law, we have legal authority to follow up such cases and the security institutions are obliged to cooperate with us.” Widespread impunity and a lack of accountability for police misconduct and crime continue to be major impediments for the establishment of good governance and the rule of law in Afghanistan, however General Hekmat Shahi Rasooli, Head of Human Rights, Women and Children Affairs at the MoI said: “We have always been supportive of the supervision process, together with the AIHRC. We soon hope to have a MoU which will be signed between the MoI and AIHRC, but there are still some issues which are in contradiction with the Police Law. Those terms of references which contradict the police law should be removed from the memorandum of OPO.” EUPOL’s support will continue, due to the highly significant nature of the AIHRC work and its direct relevance to accountable civilian policing. Under EUPOL’s Ministry of Interior Reform Component, Police Oversight and Accountability is now one of the primary concerns. Head, of this component, Tarmo Miilits, who opened the meeting, said: “External oversight of the police is a fundamental cornerstone of the civilian policing phhilosophy, if we are to build trust and confidence in Afghan communities. The mainstreaming of human rights and gender issues within the ANP and the wider justice sector, is one of the important strategic objectives for EUPOL strategic advisers for the next two years”. Clearly there remain many obstacles and barriers to this work and there has been instances of resistance from the Ministry of the Interior to allow such inspections and oversight, for obvious reasons. Ultimately this work must form part of any democratic society but the final test will be how many cases are investigated and how many individuals are arrested and more importantly prosecuted. Only then will trust and confidence be enhanced amongst Afghan communities and the individual victim’s concerned. There now appears to be a strong political will from the new President to root out all corruption, especially in public office, so the work of the AIHRC will be closely monitored, as will the response from those who they seek to interview and support. Find out more about the AIHRC on their website at aihrc.org.af/ Find out more about EUPOL and our mandate at eupol-afg.eu Follow our Acting Head of Mission on Twitter @EupolAfg_HoM
Posted on: Sat, 24 Jan 2015 09:29:04 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015