| Iraqi Police الشرطة العراقية Shurta/Polis | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Abbreviation | IP |
| Agency overview | |
| Formed | January 9, 1922 (1922-01-09) 2003 (2003) |
| Employees | 397,264 |
| Jurisdictional structure | |
| Operations jurisdiction | Iraq |
| Governing body | Ministry of Interior |
| General nature | |
TheIraqi Police (Arabic:الشرطة العراقية), officially part of theGeneral Directorate of Public Security (Arabic:مديرية الأمن العام), is the primary civilian law enforcement agency under the authority of theMinistry of Interior responsible for maintaining internal security and enforcing law and order throughoutIraq.
The current Iraqi Police has some links with the pre-war Iraqi police service, which was professional and low in repression priority. Therefore, the police were expected to remain cohesive and to be a useful instrument after the invasion as well.[1]
It was intended to form the basis for the police force of the new Iraq, but the civil disorder caused this project to be abandoned.[2]Following the emergency stipend payment, some police came back especially in Baghdad and theU.S. Army military police conducted emergency training.[2] At the same time, in the south the British forces began to establish local police forces in coordination with Shiite religious leaders.[2]
In the north, Kurdishsecurity forces did not experience any interruption, and inMosul a thousand former police officers were hired by Major GeneralDavid Petraeus to maintain the public order.[3]
In the meantime, theCoalition Provisional Authority worked with the renewed Ministry of Interior to purge Baathist officials (7,000 police officers fired byBernard Kerik only in Baghdad) and to establish a police forces in short terms.[4] In the first four months, the first training course was launched and over 4,000 officers were trained.[3] In 2003 recruitment, applicants were mostly former soldiers and police officers who served under the Baathist rule. At the end of 2003, Iraqi Police formally totalled 50,000 officers.[5]
In 2009 the Iraqi Police was under the command of Major General Hussein Jassim Alawadi.[6] TheMulti-National Security Transition Command – Iraq (MNSTC-I) was aUnited States Central Command organisation tasked to train, mentor and equip all Iraqi civilian security forces. MNSTC-I also had thegoal of training their counterparts in the Iraqi government of Iraq to assume their role. MNSTC-I was dissolved in 2010.
The Iraqi Police had three main branches:
By 2012–13 there were four Federal Police Divisions, spread out around the country. The 1st and 2nd Motorized Divisions were headquartered in Baghdad and created out of the former Commando Division and the Public Order Division.[9] The 3rd Federal Police Division, under the auspices of theNinewa Operational Command with its headquarters inMosul, collapsed in the ISIS 2014Northern Iraq offensive by June 9.[10] The 4th Division was headquartered in Basra. Some reinforcing units, such as the 9th Brigade, 4th Federal Police Division, also withered once deployed to the front lines.[11]
The Iraqi Police Service uniform consists of a long-sleeved, light-blue shirt with a bluebrassard on the left arm with an embroideredIraqi flag and "Iraqi Police" embossed in English andArabic, black or light-blue trousers or blue combat trousers similar to those of theUnited States Navy. They wear a dark-bluebaseball cap with "POLICE" in white letters or body armour and aPASGT helmet.
Federal Police wear a black-and-blue camouflage uniform similar to the U.S.Army Combat Uniform Universal Camouflage Pattern,[12] which includes a baseball cap, body armour and PASGT helmet. FP uniforms are issued when an officer has completed training; officers not yet trained wear a variety of uniforms, includingwoodland camouflage. FP officers are organised into brigades which cover geographic areas. Rank insignia for the IP is nearly identical to that of the Iraqi Army, except that the shoulder boards are usually dark blue.
Officers ranks and ranks of NCOs and constables are the same that of Iraqi army, from highest to lowest, with symbol on epaulette, as below:
| Rank group | General / flag officers | Senior officers | Junior officers | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Iraqi Police |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| General | Lieutenant General | Major General | Brigadier | Colonel | Lieutenant Colonel | Major | Captain | First Lieutenant | Lieutenant | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Warrant Officer | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Iraqi Police |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | |
| Warrant Officer (1st Class) | Warrant Officer (2nd Class) | Warrant Officer (3rd Class) | Warrant Officer (4th Class) | Warrant Officer (5th Class) | Warrant Officer (6th Class) | Warrant Officer (7th Class) | ||
| Constabulary ranks | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Iraqi Police |  |  |  |  |  | |||
| Staff Seargent | Seargent | Corporal | Policeman 1st Class | Policeman | ||||
The Iraqi Police has faced a number of problems since it was reformed by theCoalition Provisional Authority afterthe fall ofBaghdad. It became the target of fighters from inside and outside Iraq; thousands of officers had been killed by gunfire and bombings byIraqi insurgents, foreign terrorists and, in some cases,friendly fire from Coalition troops.[13] An estimated 4,250 Iraqi police officers were killed from January 2005 and March 4, 2006. Due to high[14] unemployment in Iraq, many young Iraqi men had volunteered to join the police forces. A number of recruits had been killed bysuicide bombers and suicidecar bombs while queuing at police stations.[15]
The Iraqi Police had also been infiltrated[16] by insurgents, who used their access to privileged information, training and weapons for their own motives. Many police stations had been attacked[17] and blown up by Insurgents,[18] with weapons stolen from them. Police stations had also been occupied by anti-Iraqi government insurgent. As a result, many police officers abandoned their posts in response.[19] From the2003 Battle of Baghdad till October 7, 2006, 12,000 Iraqi Policemen had deserted and 4,000 had been killed.[20]
On August 17, 2016, a market owner was killed by a police officer after a brawl began when the market owner "refused to back his vehicle" in Baghdad.[21]
The Iraqi government has been accused of using (or allowing) the police and other groups to carry out sectarian killings and kidnappings ofSunni Iraqis. In December 2005, US troops found 625 inmates held in "very overcrowded" conditions in a Baghdad Interior Ministry building. Twelve of the prisoners reportedly had signs of torture and malnutrition.[22] The story gave credence to the accusations, sowing further distrust of the police force. A report into the findings at the building was promised by Iraqi presidentIbrahim Jaafari at the end of December 2005, but as of May 4, 2006, no report was issued.
TheUnited States Department of State released a 2006 human rights report accusing the Iraqi police of widespread atrocities.[23][24] In October of that year, the Iraqi government dismantled a police brigade with connections to sectariandeath squads. The dismantled brigade was transferred to a US base for retraining. Other police brigades will be investigated for links to death squads.
Iraqi Interior MinisterJawad al-Bulani announced that as of December 24, 2005, 12,000 police officers in Iraq died in the line of duty since the 2003 US-led invasion.[13][25]
Large-scale operations were conducted by coalition forces to assist in policing and train the Iraqi Police (IP) and security forces. Police transition teams (PTTs) areUS military-police squads deployed to Iraqi Police stations. The teams conduct joint patrols with the IP, share station defense and gather station information andcounter-terrorism intelligence. The joint patrols of the PTTs have helped curb violence, increasing respect for Iraq's police force. These duties were later performed byUnited States Air Force Security Forces members. An International Police Liaison Officer (IPLO), an experienced US police officer, accompanied most of the transition teams to aid post-academy training of the IP.
National Police Transition Teams (NPTT) are 11-manmilitary transition teams embedded in Iraqi Police units at the battalion, brigade, division andcorps levels. These teams are supplied by the US Army and the US Marine Corps. Like the PTTs, each team is assisted by an IPLO and one to six local interpreters.
Members of the Iraqi Police use theGlock 19 andHS2000[26] handgun, and may carry a shotgun,Type 81,[27] orAK-47 rifle on patrol. Iraqi Federal Police have also been seen using the Croatian-madeHS Produkt VHS-2 bullpup carbine during military operations against ISIS in northern Iraq.[28] For marine operations, the police are equipped with Safe Boat International 230 T-Top patrol boats.
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