OSCE/ODIHR trains Ukrainian human rights defenders on human rights monitoring, safety and security

A group of Ukrainian civil society representatives improved their human rights monitoring skills, as well as their capacity to take measures to increase their own safety and security during a training course organized by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, from 12 to 17 November 2018.

The participants were ten women and seven men who work on various issues in eastern and southern regions of Ukraine, including the human rights of Roma, women, LGBT persons, journalists, internally displaced persons and youth. They gained skills in applying a human rights-based approach in their monitoring work, improving professional conduct during field visits and verifying online evidence of human rights violations. They also learned techniques for improving their mental well-being during monitoring activities and how to use encrypted communication channels and secure their digital storage equipment.

“In addition to training the participants on how to conduct gender-sensitive human rights monitoring in a safe and secure manner, we built their capacity to develop and implement evidence-based advocacy activities and use effective communications methods and techniques to address human rights violations,” said Marc van Gool, Human Rights Adviser at ODIHR.  

Participant Olha Poliakova from Dnipro said: “This training was very useful. The new information I received and the tools we explored will be useful in my daily work, and also in future activities to monitor the position of women in police forces in the Dnipro region.”

Three women representatives of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine (SMM) also took part in the training.

The training was organized as part of ODIHR’s project on strengthening dialogue among civil society and with key governmental stakeholders in Ukraine to address important human rights issues in the country. During the project, ODIHR has trained over 150 human rights defenders from Ukraine, as well as 20 representatives from Ukrainian state institutions, through capacity-building workshops on human rights monitoring, and has supported  a number of human rights monitoring and dialogue projects carried out by human rights defenders in Ukraine.