OSCE/ODIHR trains police commanders from Poland on human rights-based policing of peaceful assemblies

Human rights-compliant policing of peaceful assemblies was the focus of training for Polish officers, organized by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) in Szczytno, Poland on 28 and 29 September 2015.

Bringing together 25 police commanders from across Poland, the participants discussed how human rights should inform their work during the planning and decision making cycle at all levels of command when policing peaceful assemblies. The training emphasized issues related to the use of force, communication and negotiation, knowledge and intelligence gathering, and facilitation of peaceful assemblies.

"This training will support Polish police commanders in their day-to-day work, particularly when it comes to engagement and communication with those organizing and taking part in assemblies," said Katarzyna Jarosiewicz-Wargan, Head of ODIHR’s Human Rights Department. "Knowledge of international human rights standards regarding freedom of peaceful assembly is critical to effective interaction with assembly organizers and can help prevent potential misunderstandings and conflicts."

Acting as an observer during the training, Krzysztof Laszkiewicz, Human Rights Adviser to the Commander in Chief of the Polish Police, said: "I believe this high quality training will be very helpful in our future work on human rights-compliant policing of peaceful assemblies."

Jakub Gorczynski, Chief of Police Operations and the Crisis Management Division at Poznan Regional Police Headquarters, said: "This training gives us opportunities to exchange experiences and offers expert knowledge that we can adapt to the Polish context and reflect critically on how we’ve been working and where we could improve. In the future, it would be helpful to have more, similar training that draws on the practical experiences of our police commanders."

This pilot training event builds on ODIHR’s work with the Polish police while developing a handbook on human rights while policing assemblies and a corresponding training programme. It will also help ODIHR improve its methodology in working with law-enforcement officers from across the OSCE region.