US lifts training ban on Northern police
Officers in the North’s new police service are free to train with the FBI after US President George W Bush signed a measure lifting the ban on RUC officers training with American law enforcement agencies.
The move is effectively a US vote of confidence in the new police service and will allow for full co-operation between US agencies and the Northern police authorities.
Members of the RUC were banned from training in America in 1999 under a law passed by Congress because of concerns over the force’s abuses of human rights.
