EU/UNDP/OHCHR Project Completes a Series of Human Rights Workshops for Law Enforcement Officials 

Ashgabat, 1 July 2010 – A series of human rights workshops have been completed in Turkmenistan within the framework of the joint project of the European Union, United Nations Development Programme and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights titled “Strengthening the national capacity of Turkmenistan to promote and protect human rights”. The workshops increased awareness of 150 professionals in the area of law enforcement and administration of justice of international human rights standards and their practical applicability in daily professional life.

The workshops were held from 8 to 29 June 2010 in the cities of Ak Bugday, Turkmenabad, Mary, Balkanabad, Dashoguz and Ashgabat. Two international experts - Iryna Serebrakova from Belarus and Mindia Vashakmadze from Georgia facilitated the workshops.

Specific themes discussed included human rights and arrest and detention, ethical and legal police conduct, policing, gender equality and non-discrimination. The workshops also reviewed human rights standards in relation to criminal investigations and trials.

“The interest shown by the police officers, prison officials, judges, prosecutors and lawyers who participated in the workshops was very encouraging,” said Iryna Serebrakova. “There is a clear need to continue such discussions and to encourage the development of policies and skills to transform the information on international human rights standards provided during the workshops into practical behavior.”

The project “Strengthening the national capacity of Turkmenistan to promote and protect human rights” is implemented in partnership with Government of Turkmenistan. The overall objective of the project is to engage the Government of Turkmenistan on its duty and capacity to comply with its international human rights standards and to improve the knowledge and capacity of rights holders to claim their rights.

Increasing awareness on human rights among law enforcement professionals is one of the key objectives of this joint project.

For more information, please contact:

Ms. Irina Liczek, Chief Technical Specialist of the EU/UNDP/OHCHR project at This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it