Human rights defenders have called for an establishment of Early Warning Analysts in Uganda.
According to the defenders, these analysts will be charged with monitoring of communities, analyzing information, occurrences, and write reports to security agencies so as to avert probable occurrences of unrest in the country. This was a resolution made by human rights defenders during a follow-up workshop on early warning mechanisms that was organized by the Uganda Human Rights Commission at Imperial Royale Hotel, Kampala on Monday 28th September 2009.
Speaking at the opening of the work shop, the Chairperson of the Commission Mr. Med S.K Kaggwa commended the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) for funding the workshop, which he noted would equip the country with capacity to respond to would-be human rights gaps.
While presenting a paper on the “Role of Human Rights Defenders in Conflict Prevention in Early Warning Mechanism”, Mrs. Margaret Sekaggya, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders called for minimal limitations on the freedoms of the rights of human rights defenders and mass sensitization of the public on the United Nations Mechanism.
The workshop drew participants from Uganda Human Rights Commission, Civil Society Organisations dealing in Human Rights, government institutions and members of the academia among others. Also during the workshop various papers were presented and these included “Early Warning Mechanisms for prevention of genocide and xenophobia in Africa”; “Current strategies for effective prevention of conflict by human rights defenders” and “An update on the road map to the 2011 General Elections: addressing the challenges”.
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