ISHR is pleased to launch its latest research exploring the extent to which national human rights institutions could act as national protection mechanisms as part of the implementation of national human rights defender protection laws in selected West African countries.
The study on the potential of National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) to serve as protection mechanisms for human rights defenders examines existing NHRIs in Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, Niger, Sierra Leone, and Togo with a view to determine the complementarity of the power, mandate and functioning of these NHRIs with the minimum principles of a protection mechanism as set out in the Model Law for the promotion and protection of human rights defenders.
In several African countries which have adopted laws for the promotion and protection of human rights defenders or are in the process of doing so, the NHRI often present itself as the logical body to host the defenders’ protection mechanism. The mechanism will be tasked to ensure the implementation of the newly adopted defenders’ law, among other things. The study particularly reviews the current mandate as well as the capacity and resources of the NHRIs examined and the needs which remain to be fulfilled for NHRIs to effectively play this role.
This study is aimed at giving a comparative analysis of the essential principles and functions of a national protection mechanism, as set out in the Model Law, and the extent to which those elements are realised in existing NHRIs in Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, Niger, Sierra Leone, and Togo.
It outlines the advantages, as well as limitations, of housing national defenders’ protection mechanisms within NHRIs, and provide recommendations aimed at enhancing their ability to do so.
For more information on the study, please contact Adélaïde Etong Kame at [email protected] or @Adelaide_ISHR
Photo: Flickr/Oxfam International
A newly-released confidential letter by a UN Special Rapporteur documents the disbarment of human rights lawyers in China and the tightening ideological control over lawyers and law firms. The UN expert denounces disappearances, closed-door trials, harassment of relatives, travel bans, and other abuses targeting human rights lawyers.
On Tuesday 16 April 2024, ISHR delivered to both Geneva’s Administrative Council and its legislative counterpart, the Municipal Council, physical copies of the more than 1000 signatures collected in support of a memorial honouring Chinese human rights defender Cao Shunli.
The 79th Ordinary Session of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights will be held in Banjul, The Gambia, from 14 May to 3 June 2024. The session will be preceded by the NGO Forum, which will be held in hybrid format from the 11-13 May 2024.
