DUSHANBE, May 17, 2011, Asia-Plus — An international conference entitled “Central Asia without the Death Penalty” has opened in Dushanbe today.
Organized by the League of Women Lawyers and the Government of Tajikistan under support of the Tajik Branch of Open Society Institute/Assistance Foundation (OSI/AF-Tajikistan) and the Government of Switzerland in the framework of Switzerland-Tajikistan Human Rights Dialogue, the conference is discussing issues related to international trends towards death penalty abolition, the situation of death penalty in Central Asia and prospects of declaring Central Asia death-penalty-free region.
60 representatives of government bodies and NGOs from the countries of Central Asia and Europe as well as experts from international organizations, Tajik court heads, Tajik chief prosecutor and representatives of diplomatic missions and international organizations active in Tajikistan have been invited to participate in the conference, the source said. Ms. Ruth Dreifuss, Member of the ICDP and former President of Switzerland, is attending the conference as a special guest.
We will recall that in order to diversify the regional application of the instrument of the Human Rights Dialogue, Switzerland decided to engage in such a dialogue with Tajikistan. Officially launched in 2009, it consists of one annual dialogue round as well as numerous complementary activities. The first round of consultation that was held in Dushanbe on June 22, 2010 determined four areas for cooperation: 1) reporting with a focus on the universal periodic review; 2) migration; 3) women’s rights and domestic violence and 4) death penalty and detention.
The dialogue also aims at sensitizing the governmental institutions towards the respect of human rights as being the legal precondition for a stable political, social and economic situation of a country. In the frame of the Dialogue, several projects have been successfully initiated.
