BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

30/01/2007

Belarus Planning Training For Vietnam's Police

Belarus' formidable Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) is planning a training programme for law enforcers from Vietnam, the Belapan news agency reported Tuesday.

"Security leadership in Vietnam was by far most interested in this aspect of cooperation with Belarus," MVD chairman Vladimir Naumov told reporters in Minsk.

"We are prepared to give the training at any time, if there is an agreement," Naumov said.

Naumov made the comments one day after returning home from an official visit to Hanoi. The MVD, Belarus' national police force, is a key element in Belarusian President Aleksander Lukashenko's authoritarian control over the former Soviet republic.

The Belarusian MVD would if necessary create a special faculty within the country's national policy academy for Vietnamese students, if Minsk and Hanoi decide on the training, Naumov said.

Hanoi police officials also reportedly are interested in acquiring "special technical materials" used by Belarusian law enforcement - a Belarusian euphemism usually meaning crowd control kit for police such as truncheons, tear gas, electric shock weapons, and personal armour.

Naumov's MVD in addition is feared by opposition activists for its agents' ability to penetrate anti-government groups, and to monitor their communications using wire taps and secret telephone monitoring.

"Experts from both sides will be studying this aspect of technical cooperation in the coming weeks," Naumov said.

Like most senior Belarusian officials, Naumov is banned from travelling to many developed nations, because of his alleged part in repression of opposition to the Lukashenko government.

His recent trip to Vietnam received wide play in Belarus' state-controlled media as "proof" Belarusian officials were welcome in foreign countries.

c 2007 DPA

Source:

http://www.playfuls.com/news_10_11401-Belarus-Planning-Training-For-Vietnams-Police.html