LAPD appoints first Muslim chaplain

LOS ANGELES, June 30 (UPI) -- The Los Angeles Police Department, hoping to improve relations with Muslims, has appointed the force's first Islamic chaplain, police officials said.

Pakistan-born Sheik Qazi Asad, 47, will become a reserve chaplain at the North Hollywood station, the Los Angeles Times reported Monday.

"We need to establish very good communication ... where both parties are talking to each other," Asad told the Times. "This is just opening up the door."

Asad, a U.S. citizen, has spent a decade working to improve relations between police and Muslim communities in Los Angeles County.

The LAPD hopes he'll strengthen relations that have suffered since the department tried to map the city's Muslim population in 2007, the newspaper said. The department abandoned the plan after critics called it religious profiling.

Asad has served as a member of the sheriff's Executive Clergy Council, on which he worked to build trust between Muslims and police.

"Officers don't know about Islam or Muslim communities in Los Angeles," Lt. Mark Stainbrook, who oversees community outreach for the department's counter-terrorism and criminal intelligence bureau, told the Times. "He's going to be a person who can educate them to that."

American Muslims account for less than 1 percent of the department's nearly 10,000 officers, the Times said.