Program Name: Countering Terrorism and Countering Violent Extremism Professional Development Program for Bangladesh Police
Program Leader: Dr. Julian Droogan, Counter Terrorism and Countering Violent Extremism Expert, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.
Program Facilitator: Ms Rawshan Sadia Afroze, Deputy Director (Academic), PSC, the Australia Awards and Macquarie University alumna and was the instrumental in assisting the partnership between PSC and Macquarie University for the success of the fellowship program.
The Department of Security Studies and Criminology (DSSC), Macquarie University, Australia has organized a 3-week long ‘Counter Terrorism and Countering Violent Extremism Professional Development Program’ for the 13 mid to senior level police officers from Police Staff College Bangladesh under the Australia Awards Fellowship R 16 program funded by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), Australian Government held from 23 April – 13 May 2017. Dr. Julian Droogan, Counter Terrorism and Countering Violent Extremism Expert of DSSC leaded this program with the aim in enhancing their institutional ability to proactively engage in the policy development and operations on countering violent extremism (CVE) and counter terrorism (CT) in Bangladesh. Australia Awards and Macquarie University alumna Ms Rawshan Sadia Afroze, Deputy Director (Academic), Police Staff College was the instrumental facilitating the partnership between PSC and Macquarie University for the successful Fellowship program.
The program design was outstanding and tailor-made. The fellows were highly satisfied with every of its activities. It was designed in two-way communications modality to exchange the information and best practices between each. The course content includes: General Understanding of CT and CVE, CT Policing in Australia, Violent Extremism in Diverse Communities- Causes & Trends and Experience to Work with Communities, Cyber Terrorism and its Criminal Justice Approaches, Policing of Terrorism, the Dark Net and Cryptography, Terrorism Financing & Financial Tracking, Legal Approaches of CT from International and Australian perspective, Violent Extremism in relation to Religion and Radicalization, De-radicalization and its Relation to Police and Prison, Australian Federal Police strategy on CT/CVE, Private Sectors on the efforts of CT/CVE, Australian Border Security in Relation to CT, Intelligence Coordination in terms of CT/CVE, Police ethics and CT and finally some thought on the Future of Terrorism. Besides, the fellows had group activities to do comparative study between Australia and Bangladesh on CT/CVE areas. For this, they were divided into three groups during the commencement of the program which they presented at the end after being familiar with the Australian as well as global Counter Terrorism issues.
They also had some important field visits for professional learning such as NSW Police Operation Centre and NSW Water Police to understand field level police operation system in NSW, Sydney Opera House to understand the security management of Australia’s one of the Key Point Installations and the Australian Institute of Police Management (AIPM)-the apex police training institute of Australia.
Apart from these training activities, DSSC hosted a luncheon meeting to the PSC faculties where from Macquarie University Professor Dr. Benjamin Schreer- the head of the Department and Dr. Julian Droogan- the program leader and from PSC Mr. Mohammad Golam Rasul- MDS (A&R), Ms. Rawshan Sadia Afroze- DD (Academic) and Sarker Omar Faroque- DD (Administration) attended. They had very warm interactive and fruitful discussions on the progress and various issues regarding the Memorandum of Understanding between PSC and Macquarie University.
