Victoria Police have met with members of the Australian African community to formalise the taskforce they hope will curb youth gang crime.
The task force, to be comprised of leaders of the state's African communities, will support police by advising on how to prevent crimes and reporting cases of racial vilification.
It comes after a series of recent assaults, home invasions and armed robberies, mostly in western Melbourne, which have allegedly involved youths from African communities.
Deputy Commissioner of Regional Operations Andrew Crisp said it was a great discussion.
Mr Crisp said "Really we talked through a whole range of issues in relation to some of the causes or underlying factors, but we kept bringing it back to what is the relationship between Victoria Police and the community, how can we stregthen that, how can we build on that to actually better understand what is going on in the community and at a tactical and strategical level for Victoria Police, how do we react to what we are seeing at the moment."
