The goal of a police advisory group of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Kyrgyzstan is to restore trust in police, the Kyrgyz Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday.
"One of the main goals of the OSCE police advisory group in the republic is to help restore trust in police among the population," the statement said.
The group "will monitor the situation and the work of law enforcement agencies in the country's South, will curtail law enforcement agencies and the population from illegal acts, and will stimulate local governing organs and the state structure to carefully investigate statements and wishes by the civilian population," according to the document.
Kyrgyzstan saw violent interethnic clashes in mid-June that killed up to 300 people according to official estimates, with the unofficial death toll reaching 2,000. About 100,000 people fled to neighboring Uzbekistan to avoid the worst interethnic violence in two decades. Hundreds of houses have been destroyed in the riot-hit Osh and Jalalabad regions.
Following the riots, OSCE agreed to provide support to Kyrgyzstan, which would include a police mission of 52 officers sent to the country's violence-hit southern regions.
Critics say the OSCE mission is redundant because the situation in the country has been already stabilized.
Fliers are being handed out in Kyrgyzstan's South calling for people to hit the streets in protest against the police mission.
BISHKEK, August 3 (RIA Novosti)
