By EDDIE OSIFELO
PRIME Minister Manasseh Sogavare wants to see a permanent arrangement established with the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) to response to future uprisings.
This after the China Police Liaison Team (PLT) completed five months of training the Royal Solomon Islands Police officers and Correctional Services of Solomon Islands last week.
Speaking at the demonstration of joint training between PRC and the Solomon Islands police at Rove field last Friday, Sogavare said going forward he would like to see a more permanent arrangement in place.
He said an arrangement that is not only reactionary to certain situations, but one that is forward looking in identifying gaps and addressing these gaps before these gaps are exposed by situations such as the November Riots.
“Whilst we have MOUs in place, I think it is prudent that Solomon Islands and the Peoples Republic of China start discussion on how we can elevate the current joint training arrangement to a more permanent arrangement with clearly defined expected outcomes which aim at ensuring that RSIPF and CSSI have capability in the long term.
“If we achieve such capability, we will not have to depend on other countries to assist us to deal with our internal threats,” he said.
“Let me repeat it that as a sovereign country we cannot continue to depend on other countries to look after us.
“We must have the capability to address our internal threats,” Sogavare said.
“I see this current training arrangement including other capability package by our other donor partners as a first step in addressing our capability to ensure that we are not dependent on another country when it comes to addressing our internal threat.
“We want our discipline agencies to be self-sustainable with integrity and professionalism,” he added.
“As a country we will continue to explore how we can actively promote long-term enforcement cooperation with all our bilateral partners to bring peace and security for the people of Solomon Islands,” he added.
