Promoting and protecting human rights

Training programmes aim to develop a better understanding of accountable and effective policing through the study of universally accepted human rights standards and practices. To date, police in 42 member countries have been trained. The police are a key front line agency in any country, thus their respect for or abuse of human rights touches many of their people and thereby their sense of how their rights are upheld by state agents.

Training focuses on issues such as:

• crowd management
• arrest and detention
• search and seizure 
• use of force 
• dealing with suspects and victims
• working with vulnerable groups.

Courses have taken place in many countries including Bangladesh, Cameroon, Ghana, Jamaica, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritius, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Seychelles, Solomon Islands, Uganda, Vanuatu and Zambia.

While some of these training programmes focus on police in one country, others are open to police in countries across a region. In 2009, for instance, a programme in Malaysia involved police from across ASEAN, including Laos, Thailand and Vietnam.

This training is intended to contribute to human rights standards, principles and practices becoming a strong element of policy, management and operations of police services.

Trainers at these workshops either are or were law enforcement officials. Pieter Cronjié, formerly of the South Africa Police Service, has been involved in all programmes since their inception.

“We have moved away from old style lecturing in order to pass on information in an easily digestible way,” he explains. “We use role play exercises, group discussions and present case studies and problems, which we then discuss with each other.”