Co-operation between police and public discussed in Yerevan
The role of community policing in crime prevention and strengthening police-public partnership was the focus of the conference organized by the OSCE Office in Yerevan, the Armenian Police and the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF) on 4 June 2015.
The conference brought together international and local experts, civil society and police representatives to discuss introduction of community policing and the best practices of police co-operation with state and non-state institutions. Participants were introduced to the OSCE approach to community policing by an expert from the Strategic Police Matters Unit of the OSCE Secretariat and the experience of law enforcement agencies in European countries by DCAF experts.
The Armenian Police representatives talked about the main challenges of the community policing in Armenia while representatives of civil society shared their experience of building the partnership with the Armenian police.The issue of how important is the role of the media in building police-public relations was also discussed during the event.
The Conference will be followed by a workshop discussing similar issues involving middle-rank commanders of the Armenian police and the staff of the Police Educational Complex.