Benque Viejo Police Station gets upgraded

Last month officials from the Guatemalan Police Force visited Belize and had high praise for the Benque Viejo del Carmen police and joint efforts to fight crime near the Western Border. Yesterday the officers in Benque got another boost in morale as well as improved working conditions with the inauguration of their new station. According to the Ministry of National Security, the Benque Police Station has now been upgraded to an independent command formation and will no longer be a substation of San Ignacio. Inspector Mark Flowers told News Five the fully renovated facility has eleven sections and includes three detention cells, crimes investigation, prosecution and traffic offices, as well as reception area. Flowers says the construction work, which began in February of last year, was a community effort completed through the assistance of the present Ministry of National Security. The Benque formation will be under the command of Superintendent Melecio Uck. Inspector Flowers is moving to the Police Training School in Belmopan next week. The Benque formation currently has thirty-three officers, but Inspector Flowers says this will be increased to forty-seven after the start of the new fiscal year and is expected to be further increased to eighty-one by the year two thousand.