OSCE Centre, Interior Ministry organize community police days in Kyrgyzstan

BISHKEK, 4 October 2006 - Making sure residents get to better know community police officers working in their neighborhoods is the aim of a Police Day taking place in the northern Kyrgyz town of Karakol today.

During the event, organized with the help of the OSCE Centre in Bishkek under a police assistance programme for Kyrgyzstan, residents of Karakol will participate in different competitions, ride police horses, view police cars and motorcycles and attend a show of police dogs.

"We want to improve the quality of policing in Kyrgyzstan," said Ambassador Markus Muller, the Head of the OSCE Centre. "The OSCE police assistance programme was designed to develop a police force that works with the public and for the public to prevent and solve crimes. This is one of the Centre's major projects and a pioneer project in Central Asia."

Interior Minister, Murat Sutalinov, added: "The main goal of the reform is to change the mentality of the Kyrgyz militia. We would like the public to understand that the Ministry is not a punitive body, but an organization that helps protect human rights and freedoms."

A Police Day was also held in Bishkek last Saturday, and a similar event will take place in Osh, in the south of Kyrgyzstan, on 21 October.