- the NZ PRT at work
The New Zealand Defence Force's support of Afghanistan continues, with the Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) providing assistance with local elections, Bamyan Hospital, training Afghan national police, and helping the community in general.
The PRT’s main role in Afghanistan is to strengthen security and stability, and support the development of self-sustainable provincial and district government. It does this by making its presence felt by patrolling the Bamyan region, and helping security sector reform. It is strengthening the influence of the Government of Afghanistan by helping rebuild institutions, monitoring disarmament, and reducing the causes of instability and insecurity.
NZDF helps in Afghanistan election
The PRT in Afghanistan played a role in ensuring recent elections in its part of the country went without a hitch.
The election, in which the people of Afghanistan voted for the first time for the 249 members of a new national parliament, was held on September 17.
Despite fears there could be some problems with protests and crowd control on election day, everything ran smoothly, and voting day was notably quiet, says PRT commander Colonel Tim Keating.
"The Hazari people welcome democracy, but in the leadup to the election there was a lot of violence in other parts of Afghanistan."
Some of the polling stations were three days apart, by donkey, from the regional centres, so the PRT, along with other organisations, helped distribute and collect voting material. PRT members also provided advice to other agencies about security. The aim was to help the democratic process by creating a suitable and safe environment in which people could vote.
Colonel Keating says the locals responded very positively to the PRT. "The Hazari people where we are in the Bamyan Province have known only violence in the past, so they really welcome having the New Zealanders here to help encourage peace and security."
A large number of the local population, especially in rural areas, are illiterate, so the voting forms contained photos as well as symbols of the various parties. The campaign, says Colonel Keating, was nothing like that experienced during the recent New Zealand general election.
"Posters went up in some of the towns, and there were vans with loud speakers, but no real party politics. It’s more personality politics than party manifestos."
Top, NZ PRT commander Colonel Tim Keating;below, ballot boxes are delivered on election day.
Kiwi soldiers train Afghan national police
New Zealand Army soldiers in Afghanistan are learning to use new weapons as part of a programme to train the Afghan National Police.
Six soldiers have recently trained with the Hungarianmanufactured AMD-65 assault rifle, a variant of the AK-47.
They spent two days learning to strip and assemble the weapon and practising drills, before putting it through its paces with live firing on the weapons range.
Each of the soldiers trained in the AMD-65 will train other members of the NZ PRT.
They in turn will train up to 300 members of the Afghan National Police to use the AMD-65 throughout Bamyan Province in central Afghanistan.
Corporal Kevin Packer (right) fires the AMD-65 watched by Warrant Officer Class One Jim Dawson.
Kiwis gift surgical supplies to Bamyan Hospital
The build-up to the Afghan elections saw the New Zealand Provincial Reconstruction Team (NZ PRT) medical staff working closely with Bamyan Hospital staff to prepare a plan for coping with any mass casualty incidents. NZ PRT personnel and hospital staff had several combined planning meetings and a ‘walk through’ at the hospital to ensure it had a workable plan with which both NZ PRT personnel and hospital staff would be familiar.
Bamyan hospital is a 60-bed facility that serves as the referral centre for all of the province’s health clinics. The hospital provides surgical, medical, paediatric, obstetric and gynaecology services and has basic laboratory and x-ray facilities. It currently has a very limited ability to sterilise surgical supplies, due to the breakdown of three of their five sterilisation units. As part of the preparation for possible mass casualty incidents, the NZ PRT medical team sourced disposable surgical gowns and theatre drapes from US medical logistics. This equipment gives the Bamyan surgical team the ability to perform multiple operations back-to-back without being restricted by very limited sterilisation capacity.
The NZ PRT is also looking at a long-term solution for the hospital’s sterilisation problems and hopes to be able to provide the necessary parts to ensure that all the hospital’s autoclaves (sterilisers) and sterilisation units can be returned to full function. Other PRT projects at the hospital include digging a well and constructing a laundry building. Currently an obstetrics and gynaecology building funded by NZAID is under construction.
Bamyan Province, like most of Afghanistan, faces many significant challenges in the health sector. The average life expectancy for Afghan males is 41 years, 42 for females, and one in four children die before adulthood.
NZDF medical staff with their Bamyan Hospital colleagues take delivery of equipment.
Kiwi 3, one of the PRT patrols, has recently been providing basic hygiene kits to villagers in Aq Rabat Pass, an area about 45 minutes drive northwest of Kiwi Base. The US Aid provided kits consist of soap, towels, and toothbrushes. Most of the kits were given to the village’s children whom, it is hoped, will use them to add to the improvement of their physical health. Above, patrol medic LAC Nicole Sangars gives a lecture on basic hygiene to children and their parents, to ensure the kits are used correctly.
The villagers of Aq Rabat have been experiencing acute health problems due to contaminated drinking water. LAC Sangers and other patrol members also talked to villagers about the advantages of boiling drinking water, as well as not using water for drinking, downstream from where people bathe.