Turkey trains over 5,000 Afghan police officers

By Sayed Khodaberdi Sadat

KABUL (AA) - Turkey has trained 5,397 Afghan police officers since 2001 when the first police training agreement was signed between the two countries, Ankara’s diplomat in Kabul said on Friday.

The 2001 treaty reached by the two counties’ Interior Ministries had facilitated the training of officers in 95 different fields, Ilker Turkbayrak, Turkey’s Interior Ministry’s undersecretary in Ankara’s embassy in Kabul said.

Turkbayrak told Anadolu Agency that a new phase began in 2011 with bi-yearly courses at a police training center in Turkey’s central Sivas province.

Noting that 1,335 female officers were trained, he said Turkey was proud to have played such a major role in the training of half of Afghanistan’s female police personnel.

He said there were plans to increase the proportion of women in the force within next four years.

As part of another deal in 2015, 60 officers graduated in 2018 from Ankara’s Police Academy, 20 of which were sent to Afghanistan as trainers.

"Our military cooperation with Afghanistan goes far back, the first trainers of the Afghan national army were taught by Turkish officers sent by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk," Turkbayrak said.