Our CEO Jane Townsley continues to provide capacity development for both the Bangladesh Policewomen’s Network (BPWN) and the Bangladesh Police working in the Cox’s Bazar area, the location of over 30 Rohingya refugee camps. She completed two missions in the past 12 months, in October 2019 and again in February 2020 delivering Gender Based Violence (GBV) training to members of the Armed Police Battalion of the Bangladesh Police who now have responsibility for the safety and security of the refugee camps, and facilitating the BPWN to develop a strategic plan.

During the February 2020 mission, Jane visited two of the refugee camps to meet with the female officers posted there and complete a gap analysis assessing their needs to enable them to provide the best service possible to victims of VAWG. During one of these visits she also met up with one of the APB participants of the GBV training, establishing how he had been able to put his learning into practice and share it with his colleagues.

Despite the lack of international travel, we are continuing to support UN Women with this vital work and will soon be delivering online training to a group of APB staff to become trainers so they can deliver GBV training well into the future. We will provide on-going mentoring and support during 2020 and 2021 as they develop their skills and overseeing their training delivery.

We have also been supporting UN Women to build the capacity of the BPWN through a series of workshops, to develop a 3-year strategic plan together with annual workplans to strengthen the network’s position and empower it to support Bangladesh Police to continue to develop into a gender responsive service in line with a number of international treaties and agreements including the UN Security Council resolution 1325. We will continue to support this work by facilitating the development of a performance monitoring framework for implementation of the strategic plan and by providing on-going support to ensure BPWN is sustainable into the future.