Media Note
Office of the Spokesperson
Washington, DC
February 13, 2013

On February 12, 2013, Afghanistan’s Minister for Counter Narcotics Zarar Moqbel Osmani and U.S. Embassy’s Coordinating Director for Rule of Law and Law Enforcement Ambassador Stephen G. McFarland announced $18.2 million in Good Performers Initiative (GPI) awards. GPI awards are given to provinces that achieved or retained poppy-free status, reduced net poppy cultivation by more than 10 percent over the previous year, or made other exceptional counternarcotics efforts during the cultivation season. Twenty-one of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces received GPI awards, including 17 provinces that earned $1 million awards for being poppy-free. MORE

Media Note
Office of the Spokesperson
Washington, DC
September 26, 2012

Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs William R. Brownfield will travel to San Diego, California to participate in the 119^th Annual International Association of Chiefs of Police Conference on September 30, and the Institute of the Americas Conference on Gangs, Youth and Demand Reduction on October 1. Assistant Secretary Brownfield’s remarks at the Institute of the Americas will highlight the United States’ efforts to address the cycle of violence related to narcotics trafficking and organized gangs in the Western Hemisphere. The public is invited.

On September 30, Assistant Secretary Brownfield will sign partnership agreements with the Portland, Oregon Police Bureau and the Ohio State Highway Patrol. These law enforcement agencies will join the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) and its more than 50 state and local agency partners from communities around the United States who help our partners around the world to enhance their civilian security and justice sector capacity. Each state and local partner receives specialized training from the Department of State and develops key relationships for its hometown community. The Department of State pays the salaries of state and local officers while they are deployed. These partnerships enable INL to utilize the knowledge and expertise of active serving police officers to train, advise, and mentor foreign law enforcement personnel as part of the Department’s numerous foreign assistance programs to further civilian security.

To attend the partnership agreement signings or the Institute of the Americas address please contact 202-736-4144 or email INL-Press@state.gov. To receive updates on Assistant Secretary Brownfield’s visit, follow the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs on Twitter @INLbureau and Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/StateINL.

Media Note
Office of the Spokesperson
Washington, DC
September 24, 2012

The State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) announced a five-year, $7.2 million grant to Stanford Law School to expand an innovative legal education program in Afghanistan on September 24. The Afghanistan Legal Education Project (ALEP) will build on its existing partnership American University of Afghanistan (AUAF) to develop a full, five-year integrated Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Laws degree program at AUAF’s campus in Kabul, Afghanistan. This new degree program trains Afghan students to become professional lawyers who can provide much-needed legal representation services, help enforce Afghanistan’s constitution, help stabilize the country through rule of law, and become legal educators to teach Afghanistan’s next generation of lawyers.

The new degree-granting program is the latest in a series of efforts by Stanford Law School faculty and students to enhance legal education in Afghanistan. They launched ALEP in 2007 as a project to develop legal textbooks for AUAF. In 2010, INL partnered with Stanford to support the project. Most recently, Stanford and AUAF developed a certificate in Legal Studies, available as a supplemental credential to AUAF graduates who complete seven law courses. The first certificates were awarded last spring and the program is popular with students. This semester, ALEP classes have more than 260 students registered, and approximately 20 percent are female.

The new bachelor degree program will build on this existing certificate program. ALEP will continue to use and develop textbooks written by Stanford Law students and rigorously vetted by Stanford faculty, AUAF law faculty, and senior judges, officials, and lawyers in Afghanistan. The curriculum will emphasize practical skills, professional responsibility, and substantive instruction in criminal, commercial, comparative, Islamic, and international law. A number of courses will be practice-oriented and geared to experiential learning.

Law is an undergraduate discipline in Afghanistan; students will first enroll in two years of AUAF’s general liberal arts education, followed by three years of legal studies instruction. The first class of this new law degree-granting program will graduate in 2015.