Workshop for human rights field officers opens

Accra, Sept. 8, GNA - The International Programme for Peace-Building and Good Governance for African Civilian Personnel (ITPPGG) on Monday opened a two-week introductory training course for human rights field officials in Africa. The course, which brings together 23 participants from 16 African countries is aimed at providing training for individuals to understand working in the human rights sphere.

According to Dr. Kenneth Ahorsu, a Research Fellow at the Legon Centre for International Affairs (LECIA), the overall objective of the course is to provide the participants with the necessary technical and practical skills that would ensure them work in human rights field. He said the success of such courses should be measured by the degree to which field presence contributes to a sustainable improvement in human rights situations.

Dr. Ahorsu said human rights support programmes should conduct diagnostic monitoring to analyse the precise source of weakening in the protection of human rights.

"Based on the essential analysis, the programme should follow-up its own recommendations concerning action by local authority, UN agencies and facilitate their fulfilment." He expressed the hope that the course would challenge and facilitate the participants to approach their own development as an ongoing process with a range of relevant skills and experience. Mr Stefano Mancini, Economic Counsellor, Italian Ambassador to Ghana, said global security and peace required that efforts were to restore stability and promptly respond to appeals for reconstruction. "Great efforts ought to be made, moreover, to prepare men and women to post-conflict management issues," he added. Mr Mancini urged the participants to study the legal basis and the political complexities of post-conflict interventions in order to prevent and mitigate such situations. He expressed his country's commitment to make contributions to peace by supporting higher education initiatives. The course is a joint initiative between the LECIA of the University of Ghana and the International Training Programme for Conflict Management of the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna of Pisa, Italy.