Program on National Security Research Briefing

Afghan Police Reform and the Future of Afghanistan

Michael Clarke, Director, Royal United Services Institute (London) and Andrew Garfield, Senior Fellow, FPRI

September 17, 2009 / Reserve Officers Association, Washington, D.C.

Achieving a minimum level of stability in any post-conflict society is an absolute prerequisite for effective and durable reconciliation and reconstruction. To achieve even the most basic level of stability requires a well managed, competent and impartial police force operating within an institutional framework defined by law. Evidence strongly suggests that the Afghan National Police (ANP) has not achieved even a minimum acceptable standard expected of a police force in a democratic society. Without reform, the ANP will be incapable of maintaining law and order in Afghanistan or of becoming an institution capable of underpinning and protecting Afghanistan’s fledgling democracy.

The Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI) and the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies (RUSI) have just completed a study on how best to reform the Afghan National Police and presentd their findings in a report released at the briefing.

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