Strengthen human rights commission
Urges NHRC chief
National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) Chairman Prof Mizanur Rahman yesterday stressed the need for strengthening the commission to ensure human rights in the country.
“The NHRC needs to build its capacity to deliver better services to the nation...there is a lack of human resources in the commission,” he said.
He was addressing a workshop, “Universal Periodic Review (UPR) Recommendations and Follow-up on Institutional Development”, at Brac Centre Inn in the capital.
UPR of the United Nations is a unique process involving a review of the human rights records of all 192 member states of the UN once every four years.
NHRC, Bangladesh organised the workshop in cooperation with United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Danish International Development Agency (Danida), Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).
Mizanur said the government was committed to the international community in fulfilling its obligation to ensure human rights.
“And all institutions, like Bangladesh Law Commission, Information Commission, Anti-Corruption Commission and Bangladesh Election Commission, are very important to promote democracy and ensure human rights in the country,” he said.
About institution development, he said, “Only upgrading the police force is not called institutional development. It must reach the public level.”
Mizanur said UPR was a state-driven process, providing each state the opportunities to display steps taken to improve the human rights situation.
Addressing the workshop, United Nations Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative in Bangladesh Neal Walker said NHRC needed to be strengthened to ensure human rights in the country.
“I strongly appeal to the government of Bangladesh to increase budgetary allocation to strengthen the capacity of the National Human Rights Commission,” he said.
On institutional development, he said the judiciary, Information Commission and NHRC could play a vital role in the country's development by providing the facts to the government.
He suggested formulating a comprehensive judiciary policy and strengthening the judiciary system in Bangladesh.
Law Commission acting chairman Prof Shah Alam said creating awareness on human rights was very important as the population's 51 percent was not aware of human rights till now.
On NHRC's limitations, he said NHRC lacked sufficient manpower, making it quite impossible for NHRC to take any massive awareness programme.
Terming Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) an effective institution, he said Rab activities needed to be internally monitored to punish violators of human rights.
Rights activists and experts at the workshop urged the government to put emphasis on institutional development to ensure human rights and achieve sustainable development.
They observed that institutional development was considered vital to achieve sustainable development and essential to facilitate institutional changes for improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the institutions.
Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust Executive Director Barrister Sara Hossain, NHRC full-time member Kazi Rezaul Hoque and NHRC honorary member Prof Niru Kumar Chakma also spoke at the workshop.
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