Georgetown – The U.S. Department of Justice and the Guyana Ministry of Public Security are working together to provide training to the Guyana Police Force Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) under the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI) Police Integrity Program. This joint project is designed to strengthen OPR initiatives in CBSI police agencies including Dominica, St. Lucia, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Barbados. Through the International Criminal Investigative Training Assistance Program (ICITAP), former police officers with more than 120 years of collective experience are working with foreign governments, including Guyana, to develop professional and transparent law enforcement institutions that protect human rights, combat corruption, and reduce the threat of transnational crime and terrorism. In this intensive program that spans from August 17-September 3, U.S. officers are providing practical capacity building training in two primary areas: Internal Affairs and Audits/Inspections. Since April 2013, the Bureau of International Narcotics & Law Enforcement (INL) has deployed DOJ-ICITAP to implement the INL-funded “CBSI Workplan,” a three-year police development program supporting the Regional Security System (RSS) and its seven member states of the Eastern Caribbean. The OPR project falls within this workplan.
ICITAP provides international development assistance that supports both national security and foreign policy objectives. Toward this goal, the CBSI Police Integrity Program provides assistance in the development of requisite skills to staff and deploy personnel to competently investigate, analyze and report on individual and organizational performance as measured against professional standards. Program actions to be taken include identifying willing development partners, tailoring the program model to address country-specific requirements, building of capacity for appropriate police staff and sustaining of program inertia via direct consultation to operationalize the new capacities.
The CBSI partnership with the Caribbean was launched by U.S. President Barack Obama at the Fifth Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago in April 2009 and is a cornerstone of an integrated, multilateral hemispheric security strategy that seeks to enhance citizen security, promote social justice, and combat illicit trafficking. This police training program represents another example of the growing bilateral relationship between the U.S. and Guyana.
