U.S. Marines working round-the-clock to reinforce new police force [Image 1 of 10]

AL QA'IM, IRAQ

06.15.2006

Photo by Spc. Antonio Rosas 

I Marine Expeditionary Force

Lance Cpl. Vincent M. Gutilla, a 20-year-old Marine rifleman from Company B, 1st Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, mentors an Iraqi policeman on providing perimeter security at the police station in Husaybah, a city of about 50,000 citizens, May 15, 2006. More than 300 local Iraqis from Euphrates River towns near the Iraqi-Syrian border lined up at the Marines outpost in hopes of becoming policemen recently. Despite several attacks on the police force in the nearby city of Husaybah, a border city of about 50,000 people, Maj. Robert C. Marshall, the military transition team officer-in-charge says the Iraqis are willing to serve because a cop's monthly salary is a lot of money for the average Iraqi -- around $100 a month. The push for a police force in the region near the border came after months of urging from the local tribal sheikhs who are eager to see a police force restored with men from their tribes, according to the local police transition team -- a group of U.S service members who train, mentor and develop local police forces. The transition team is working on equipping the one of the region's newest police forces -- in Karabilah, a city of about 30,000 citizens -- with weapons, flak vests, uniforms and furniture so that the Iraqis can live and work out of their police station. Gutilla is from Clovis, Calif. (Photo by Cpl. Antonio Rosas)

• Date Taken: 06.15.2006
• Date Posted: 07.06.2006 13:15
• Photo ID: 25211
• Resolution: 1200x821
• Size: 307.43 KB
• Location: AL QA'IM, IQ