Darfur: 189 Police Advisers Arrive To Join Mission

Darfur: 189 Police Advisers Arrive To Support Joint UN-African Union Mission

New York, Oct 3 2008 3:10PMA total of 189 police advisers from 12 countries, including 17 female officers, have arrived in Darfur to join the African Union-United Nations Hybrid Operation (UNAMID), which is trying to quell the deadly fighting and humanitarian suffering that have raged since 2003 in the western Sudanese region.

The latest arrivals – from Malaysia, Malawi, Jordan, Yemen, Pakistan, Uganda, Nepal, Bangladesh, Turkey, Senegal, El Salvador and South Africa – bring the total number of UNAMID Police Advisers to 1,877, out of a mandated strength of 3,772.

The mission’s Police Advisers are involved in training Community Policing Volunteers in camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) and capacity-building for the Government of Sudan Police and other parties to the Darfur conflict, to enable them to operate according to internationally accepted standards of policing.

They are also involved in monitoring investigations into gender-based violence cases, confidence-building patrols in IDP camps and supporting the delivery of humanitarian assistance to IDPs in Darfur.

UNAMID, which is slated to become the world body’s largest peacekeeping operation with some 26,000 personnel at full strength, currently has some 10,000 troops and police officers on the ground and still lacks essential equipment, including helicopters.

An additional 3,000 personnel – mostly from Ethiopia and Egypt – are expected to be joining UNAMID in the next two months, bringing the total number of troops by the end of November to about 13,000.

The five-year long conflict in Darfur between rebels, the Government and allied Janjaweed militiamen has claimed the lives of about 300,000 people and displaced more than 2.7 million.
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