A three-day human rights workshop for West African journalists will commence today in Banjul. The workshop has been organised by the Secretariat of the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) with funding from the Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA).

According to a press release from ACHPR, the workshop, to be held at the Paradise Suites Hotel, “will deal mainly with human rights journalism, focusing on the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights and the work of the African Commission.”

Ways in which human rights journalists in the sub-region could use their skills and knowledge to publicise the work of the African Commission will also be explored.

The workshop has been organised under the theme ‘an understanding of the African human Rights system’ and will deal with such issues as freedom of expression, restrictions on the media and the rationale for restrictions.

Participating journalists will come from Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea Conakry, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, Nigeria, Niger, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.