New rules within the Local Police: Agents will be armed with lethal guns – Mures News, Targu Mures News

April 27, 2024

Local Police agents from all over Romania will be able to be equipped with lethal weapons, according to a draft law that seeks to change their powers, among other things. Currently, the Local Police agents are equipped with pistols with rubber bullets, but the project could change this, according to adevarul.ro.

In addition to being equipped with the new weapons, the Local Police could receive new skills, including in guarding the objectives and in the field of road traffic, and the agents will have the obligation to attend professional training courses.

“MDLPA implemented the Project entitled “Consolidation of the institutional capacity of central public administration authorities with attributions in the field, in order to increase the quality of the local police public service”, MySMIS Code 129988, SIPOCA Code 722, in partnership with the National Agency of Public Servants and the National Institute of Administration. The main objective of the project was to improve the legal and institutional framework regarding the organization and operation of the local police to ensure effective management of the local policeman’s career, as well as the modernization of the continuous training system and the improvement of their training”, it is stated in the explanatory note of a legislative project under public debate on the website of the Ministry of Development (MDLPA).

By and large, the local police officers remain with the same missions, but there will be changes regarding their competences, more precisely, in the area of ​​guarding the objectives. In this way, apart from the security of goods, competences will be introduced in the security of valuables, including during transport. As for the competences in the road field, the local policemen will have attributions regarding traffic management. Currently, these agents can only issue penalties for illegal parking.

Lethal weapons for local police

The bill also provides for equipping local police with lethal weapons, but only in some cases, it is true. Currently, these agents are equipped with rubber bullet weapons at most. “Taking into account the way in which the local police service is organized, the fact that the activity of the local police is governed, among other things, by the principle of prevention and considering all the implications of the provision and use of lethal weapons, it is proposed to carry out the provision of lethal weapons only with the approval of the Prefect’s Institution and the territorial structures of the Romanian Police, after analyzing the value of the crime indicators and the seriousness of the criminal acts, existing at the level of the locality. The staffing of local police structures is currently carried out in a different way, the new regulation establishes the limits in which these structures can be equipped unitarily, to provide the service at the same standards“, also appears in the motivation of the proposals.

(LP)