OSCE Mission to Skopje completes human rights training for police officers

SKOPJE, 2 November 2005 - Eleven training co-ordinators from the country's Interior Ministry were awarded certificates today at the closing ceremony for a human rights training initiative for the police, supported by the OSCE Spillover Monitor Mission to Skopje.

The ceremony marked the end of the 'Human Rights and Police in a Democratic Society' project, which began in autumn 2002. During this time, more than 5000 police officers were trained in the basics of human rights in policing.

The 11 training co-ordinators honoured today will work with their colleagues on advancing human rights awareness within the Interior Ministry.

"Training and education constitute a strong instrument for preventing conflicts and human rights violations. As this is a key factor in achieving and maintaining human security, this is one of the priority areas of the OSCE Mission. Human rights are incorporated into in all curricula prepared by the OSCE and we deem that it must be part of all training programmes," stated Murat Yildiz, Acting Head of the OSCE Mission's Police Development Department.

"In the past few years, significant progress has been achieved in promoting a human rights culture among the police, but much remains to be done to further spread the basic understanding of human rights and to translate it into daily police practice," he added.

The Director of the Interior Ministry's Bureau for Public Security, Mr. Cane Chapragoski, said: "In certain moments, there is an imbalance between protection of human rights and police actions. This is a warning sign that the respect and protection of human rights cannot be measured only if they are conducted based on legislation, but also to what extent they are respected and protected by the community."

This training will help the police and other Ministry staff to enhance their capacity to protect and respect the human rights of citizens, while performing their daily duties. It will also help in identifying possible cases of human rights violations by police officers.

The training was conducted by instructors from the Interior Ministry, OSCE and the Helsinki Committee.

The OSCE Mission also handed over a laptop computer, to facilitate the work of the training co-ordinators, to the Human Rights Training Unit.