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Kurdish group from Kurdistan looks to U.S.
prisons for model
8.5.2007
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May 8, 2007
COLUMBIA, S.C., USA, -- Years after the wars
began in Iraq and Afghanistan, officials working to
rebuild those countries are coming to South Carolina
to learn how to better organize their police and
jails.
The visits this year come amid growing concerns that
civilian law enforcement in those war-torn countries
is abusive and leaders remain ill-prepared to take
over when U.S. forces pull out.
In fact, the more than 1,000 South Carolina National
Guard troops who just arrived in Afghanistan are
there on a mission that focuses heavily on training
civilian police.
The Iraqi and Afghan visits to South Carolina are
paid for through federal contracts with private
companies.
Last week, a group of about six prison professionals
visited from Iraq's Kurdistan province. The
semiautonomous Kurdistan region to the north has
avoided the sectarian violence and human-rights
abuses more common farther south, where Sunni and
Shiite factions battle for dominance.
''There's a big difference between Kurdistan and
what needs to be done in the rest of Iraq,'' said
Jon Ozmint, director of the South Carolina
Corrections Department, who talked last week with
the Kurds in Columbia, S.C.
The entourage, including several U.S. officials from
the Justice and State departments, toured a
minimum-security prison Edgefield County last
Wednesday.
If you can put aside the thousands of Iraqis killed
by insurgent or sectarian attacks, Iraq has a much
lower crime rate than the United States or even
Europe, said Frank Ramaizel, a prisons consultant in
Baghdad for the U.S. State Department.
Petty thievery is uncommon, because Iraqi society is
governed by a culture of shame. ''The Quran says not
to steal. It would bring shame on you and your
family,'' Ramaizel said.
But practices that can get you thrown into an Iraqi
slammer might surprise Americans. For example, if
you have a car accident that destroys government
property, expect to spend 30 days in jail and pay
off the damage before you're released.
And woe to the negligent shepherd who lets his sheep
graze in a public park. That will cost you 60 days
and a letter of apology.
Iraqi prison officials are visiting federal and
state prisons in South Carolina through a U.S.
Justice Department contract with Military
Professional Resources Inc., based in Alexandria, Va.
The first group of 30 officials from Iraq's Sunni
and Shiite regions visited in January. Another group
might visit later this year, Ozmint said.
Nicole Whitaker, deputy assistant director for the
U.S. Justice Department's program to help improve
prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan, said South Carolina
was picked for the tour because its prisons are run
well with limited resources. Similar groups toured
prisons in Arizona and Florida in recent years, she
said.
Columbia Police Chief Dean Crisp said the Afghans
are ''still dealing with the very basics of
policing, much like here in the 1920s or 1930s.''
The first of several groups of Afghan police visited
with the Columbia Police Department in early April
through an Army contract with the Falls Church, Va.-based
DynCorp company.
DynCorp picked Columbia for the pilot program last
fall, and the first group of top officials from the
Afghan National Police arrived in early April for a
two-week stay.
The next group arrives June 1.
The Afghan officers fired guns at a target range,
rode along with officers and talked with
administrators. Crisp said the Afghans were
surprised by the sophistication of the equipment,
including TASER electric-shock devices and the
computers in patrol cars.
Most valuable to the Afghans, Crisp said, was the
leadership and ethics training. ''They requested
more of that.'' Afghan pay is about $70 per month,
and the low pay has contributed to bribery among
Afghan police, Crisp said.
The Kurdish group touring the prisons - wardens, a
sociologist and a psychologist among them - was
generally complimentary but not without their
criticism.
They praised the Trenton Correctional Institution's
cleanliness and good relations between managers and
guards. But one group member was surprised a doctor
visited only once a week, saying a doctor should be
on duty daily.
MCT
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