A group of police officers and soldiers are gathered around a stationary car in a sand-filled training ground; they are going through the procedures needed to search it and secure the environment around it. This is the main Police Academy in Mogadishu and Somali police officers are training to become a specialised robust police unit called “Darwish” who can take over from military forces in liberated areas in Somalia, and pave the way for civilian police to carry out their work.

The Darwish training and deployment is another step forward in supporting a military-to-civilian police transition in Somalia, under a broader transition plan agreed by the Government of Somalia and the international community. That plan outlines a transfer of security responsibilities from the African Union peace-keepers to Somali security forces, including police forces able to hold areas liberated from the terrorist group al Shabaab.

The integrated approach in action

The training taking place in the Police Academy is the first of a series of pre-deployment orientation courses carried out by the Somali Police Force (SPF) and the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) and supported by the EU - by police experts from the European Union Capacity Building Mission in Somalia (EUCAP Somalia), by military advisors from the European Union Training Mission in Somalia (EUTM Somalia), who are advising the police on field awareness, and by the EU Delegation to Somalia. United Nations (UN) agencies are also supporting the training.

The course is a follow-up to trainings already delivered by Italy’s Carabinieri to Somali Darwish recruits in Djibouti, on law enforcement and tactical scenarios. The pre-deployment course in Mogadishu is an intensive one-month training to ensure readiness for deployment.

First three hundred Darwish graduated - thirty female officers among them

The first round of three hundred Darwish graduated in February, demonstrating their skills in threat protection, explosive ordinance awareness and disposal, and arms, stop and search and field awareness, during a passing out ceremony in Mogadishu. Thirty female police officers were among those graduating.

This way of working – EU civilian and military personnel working together with international partners to support Somalia in reaching security goals - marks the first time EU CSDP civilian and military missions have worked together on police development in Somalia. It is a powerful example of how integrated EU expertise can be leveraged to support security and crisis response on the ground. It is furthermore an example on how the EU is working in partnership with the Somali government to build a more peaceful future for all Somali citizens.

Read more about the work of EUCAP Somalia, the civilian Mission that mentors and advises Somali counterparts on rebuilding Somalia's maritime civilian security governance, institutional and operational capacities.