Afghan National Police Women’s Policeman’s training course graduates first trainees

CAMP MIKE SPANN, Afghanistan – Twen­ty three women grad­u­at­ed from the Afghan Nation­al Police Women’s Policeman’s train­ing course at the ANP Region­al Train­ing Cen­ter in Mazar-e-Sharif in a cer­e­mo­ny Nov. 24.

The grad­u­a­tion cer­e­mo­ny marked the first of its kind for RTC-MeS, where 23 female police offi­cers learned the fin­er points of law enforce­ment as they pre­pare to take on the respon­si­bil­i­ties of ful­ly trained police offi­cers. (Air Force pho­to by Mas­ter Sgt. Kristi­na New­ton) Source: NATO Click to enlarge

The eight-week course is designed to lead female trainees to a lev­el of com­pe­tence and pro­fes­sion­al­ism in all aspects of police activities. 

Dur­ing the course, the women received train­ing in hand-to-hand com­bat, basic patrol prac­tices, explo­sives iden­ti­fi­ca­tion, first aid, and post explo­sion pro­ce­dures, as well as instruc­tion on the use of force and lessons on the constitution. 

“These police women have been put through a cur­ricu­lum which is prac­ti­cal in nature and cov­ers police skills,” said French Gen­darmerie Lt. Col. Didi­er Rah­mani, RTC-MeS com­man­der. “They have demon­strat­ed that they are flex­i­ble and adapt­able and will be able to accom­plish any task assigned to them.” 

The train­ing was con­duct­ed by coali­tion police train­ers who aimed to give the stu­dents two fun­da­men­tal qual­i­ties; a thor­ough knowl­edge of the process­es and reac­tions nec­es­sary for a com­plete under­stand­ing of a giv­en sit­u­a­tion, and the abil­i­ty to act deci­sive­ly under pressure. 

“Thanks to their train­ing, these police women will be well pre­pared to accom­plish their mis­sion and per­form in gru­el­ing con­di­tions, both phys­i­cal­ly and psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly,” Rah­mani said. 

The women attend­ing the class were already employed by the ANP and the Afghan Bor­der Police, but had yet to receive any for­mal train­ing and were fill­ing sup­port roles. 

After receiv­ing this train­ing, as mem­bers of the first wom­ens course at RTC-MeS, they will be able to assist in any sit­u­a­tion that requires female interaction. 

“Women are so impor­tant to the law enforce­ment mis­sion,” said Andrea Navar, WPC advi­sor. “They are nec­es­sary in search pro­ce­dures, but can also bring gen­tle­ness to police oper­a­tions so vic­tims may feel more will­ing to cooperate.” 

Accord­ing to their train­ers, the women took to the mate­r­i­al with real dri­ve and ded­i­ca­tion; how­ev­er there were hur­dles that each woman had to overcome. 

“There were a lot of cul­tur­al dif­fer­ences between the women from dif­fer­ent tribes,” Navar said. “There were also issues with lit­er­a­cy and the fact some of the train­ers were male.” 

Cours­es were offered to help improve the lit­er­a­cy rate and by the end of the class each woman could read the Dari slides that were pre­sent­ed in class. They also learned that to be suc­cess­ful, they need­ed to work togeth­er.
“As time went by, the ladies learned to accept each oth­er,” Navar said. “They real­ized that they all belong to one country.” 

By Air Force Mas­ter Sgt. Kristi­na New­ton
Region­al Sup­port Com­mand-North/NT­M‑A Pub­lic Affairs 

Source:
Allied Com­mand Oper­a­tions
NATO 

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