Ombudsman received the representatives of the Council of Europe

The Commissioner for Human Rights (Ombudsman) of the Republic of Azerbaijan develops her activity in close cooperation with all the state bodies, international organizations, NGOs and mass media from the very beginnings of activity with the purpose of creating equal opportunities for ensuring the rights of everyone without any discrimination. Thus, innovative approaches of the Ombudsman in the field of ensuring and promoting human rights of  the different groups of population has been higly assessed by the international organizations, numerous projects have been implemented in this direction, hence, the successful country model was accepted as a positive practice in other countries.

The Commissioner received the Anca Sandescu and Menno Ettema, the coordinators of the regional project on "Strengthening access to justice for the victims of discrimination or hate crimes via non-judicial mechanisms in the Eastern Partnership countries” within the framework of the joint program of the Council of Europe and the European Union on Partnership for Good Governance. The meeting was aimed at the introduction of the project and discussion of the Azerbaijani Ombudsman’s participation in it as the main partner.

 The Commissioner gave broad information about the establishment of the Ombudsman institution, its mandate, close cooperation relations built with the global and regional organizations, including the CoE and the EU, active participation in the Eastern Partnership, TAIEX and Twinning, the features and positive results of those projects.

It was mentioned that within that cooperation comprehensive awareness raising events were held regularly in the capital and regions on protection of human rights in accordance with the national and international legislation, strengthening the potentials in this direction, as well as development of legal guarantee system in compliance with the modern standards in the country and other areas.

 She  spoke about the activity of the Ombudsman in the field of protection of human rights and freedoms according to the mandate set out in the Constitutional Law, noted the obligations of the institution as a national human rights institute, as well as National Preventive Mechanism (NPM), establishment of National Preventive Group (NPG), its visits to the places which persons can’t leave on their own will, and necessary measures taken accordingly.

Speaking on the normative-legal acts adopted at the initiatve of the Commissioner, she noted the visits to all the rayons for monitoring the implementation status of the first National Program for Action to Raise Effectiveness of the Protection of Human Rights and Freedoms in the Republic of Azerbaijan, meetings held with the population, summarizing their results, submitting them to authorized bodies and publication of them as a book.  Furthermore, frequent visits to the borderline regions, taking corresponding actions for solution of revealed problems, organizing regular trainings for the staff of certain state authorities, broad awareness-raising work among the vulnerable groups of population, including refugees, IDPs, migrants, children, women and persons with disabilities. Guests were also informed on the teaching of the “Human Rights” and “Introduction to gender” subjects in Law Faculty of Baku State University at the initiative of the Commissioner, also about the Hierarchic Child Rights Education program implemented jointly with the Ministry of Education.

It was stated that numerous proposals were submitted to state authorities for during the Ombudsman’s term in activity, most of them have been realized.

The guests provided information that the mentioned project encompasses strengthening access to justice by non-judicial mechanisms for victims of discrimination or hate crimes in the Eastern Partnership countries; bringing the database systems of Ombudsman institutions on this direction in line with the European standards; cooperation of Ombudsman institutions with civil society members for fighting discrimination and regional cooperation among Ombudsman institutions on this isuue.

Questions of the guests were answered in detail, and relevant proposals were put forward with regard to the project within the meeting.

They expressed their gratitude for sincere reception and exchange of information.