January 16, 2007

Iraqi Cops Take Lead With a Little Help


By Megan McCloskey
Stars and Stripes

ALBU FARAJ — In a way, the soldiers who live, eat and work at the Albu Faraj Iraqi police station are like older brothers to the newly minted policemen.

The Police Transition Team is there for guidance — to back up the Iraqis and teach them a few things. And much like a younger brother hanging out with his older, more experienced sibling, the policemen want to prove themselves to the soldiers.

The ultimate goal being, for both parties, a functioning, independent police force.

As sheiks join together with coalition forces to fight insurgents in Jazeera, which is just across the Euphrates from Ramadi proper, Iraqi police stations get set up in the tribal neighborhoods, complete with transition teams to help the police get started.
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(Photo: An Iraqi translator working for the Army and Iraqi policemen read a ragged, water-damaged insurgent notebook found stashed with a weapons cache during an Iraqi police patrol in Albu Faraj. The notebook contains an inventory list, positions for roadside bomb emplacement and names of insurgents. About 10 mortars along with TNT in plastic bags with a detonator cord and boxes of ammunition were found in the cache.)

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