KUALA LUMPUR – The service of the canine (K9) unit which will be used by the Federal Reserve Unit (FRU) for assignments in riot areas will be activated early next year.
Bukit Aman Internal Security and Public Order Department director Datuk Seri Hazani Ghazali said the FRU has been given approval to obtain 10 K9 dogs known as riot dogs for the purpose of controlling public order in the event of untoward incidents.
“God willing, next year we will start...we don’t want the FRU to be seen as just looking after riots, we want multi-tasking – which is for special intelligence and prevention in maintaining peace or being involved in big events and disasters.
“We are also in the process of improving the skills in FRU so that it is at least comparable to the Special Malaysia Disaster Assistance and Rescue Team,” he said at a press conference after officiating the closing ceremony of FRU’s Series Two 2023 Basic Horse Riding Course at the FRU headquarters here today.
He said the service of dogs in the task of riot control and maintaining peace is very necessary because human instinct will feel fear when seeing dogs.
Hazani also suggested establishing a special team of escort dogs for escort assignments.
“In terms of the dogs’ training skills, we will learn from foreign countries because before there was a situation in France where dogs helped rescue hostages,” he said.
Earlier, Hazani had presented training completion badges to 30 FRU personnel who successfully completed the Basic Horse Riding Course.
Meanwhile, commenting on the state polls that concluded on Saturday, Hazani said the campaigning and polling process went smoothly in the six states involved without any untoward incidents.
“The polls (in the six states) were very peaceful because Malaysians are mature enough. We are also grateful to the police personnel on duty during the elections. They coped well with their assignments,” he said.
Kedah, Penang, Selangor, Negri Sembilan, Terengganu and Kelantan went to the polls on Saturday. – Bernama, August 14, 2023
