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Danish funded training for police officers on Human Rights and crime

by Sarath Malalasekera

The Royal Danish Embassy, in New Delhi will assist the Colombo University's Centre for the Study of Human Rights (CSHR) to conduct a one-year education programme in Human Rights and Crime Investigation for the officers of the Police Department.

The Centre has been conducting similar programmes on a smaller scale for many years but this is the first occasion that the Government of Denmark has become a funder. The programme will cover officers from senior level downwards, with the emphasis on OICs of Police stations and those in charge of Crime Investigation. It is expected that 600 officers will be afforded training during this period, the organisers said. The programme was inaugurated at Trans Asia Hotel recently. The key note address on "The Police as guardians of human rights" was delivered by Prof. Carlo Fonseka.

Inspector General of Police T.E. Anandarajah, Prof. Ravindra Fernando, Director CSHR and Mr. N. Selvakumaran, Dean, Law Faculty, on behalf of the Vice Chancellor, Colombo University, also addressed. Honorary Consul General for Denmark D.H.S. Jayawardena, who represented the Royal Danish Ambassador, spoke of the increasing interest Denmark was showing in assisting rehabilitation efforts in Sri Lanka in the post-conflict period and said that much more aid could be expected if the efforts to establish peace succeed. After the opening session, a working group of senior Police Officers sat down to the task of defining the needs of the programme. Topics dealt with included presentations on "The Fundamental Rights of citizens in relation to the work of the Police," "Human Rights of persons in Police custody", "Investigation through inhuman means" and "Investigation using professional skills".

After the discussion session, the group broke up into three working groups to identify the inputs required by the Police, in the course of this programme, to eliminate or reduce the incidence of human rights violations within the Police Force.

The three groups came up with useful suggestions which are now forming the basis of the detailed programme. This programme will commence shorty, the organisers said.

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