RAWALPINDI, June 18: The US has offered Pakistan help in training personnel of provincial law-enforcement agencies and capacity building for prosecutors, Dawn learnt reliably on Sunday.

Sources said that during a recent meeting of the Joint Working Group of the two governments, the United States also showed interest in providing assistance for law-enforcement reforms.

The meeting was informed that steps were being taken to modernise police in Pakistan.

The US offered more training facilities for the law-enforcement agencies and possible assistance in setting up of modern forensic laboratories in Pakistan.

Pakistan suggested that the training facilities should be extended to the provincial headquarters for better results and asked the US for more equipment for the police.

The sources both sides discussed the importance of the automatic fingerprint identification system which was being installed at the Federal Investigation Agency headquarters with a $10 million US aid.

The meeting was informed that 2,800 law-enforcement personnel had been trained in Pakistan, including the VVIP security training courses.

Pakistan informed the meeting that it had been made mandatory for police officers to undertake the courses conducted at the National Police Academy and the FIA Academy.

It was urged that training for prosecution officers should be organised at the Federal Judicial Academy.

Pakistan said the vetting process introduced by the US posed some problems and caused delay in the selection of officers for training.

The Pakistan side informed the meeting that in line with the Police Order 2002, separation of investigation from operations, establishment of a federal police complaint authority and a public safety commission were in progress, while a Criminal Justice Committee had been formed.

The United State said it had trained some 2,300 police officers from Afghanistan and it was ready to offer similar facilities to Pakistan, if demanded.