14 March 2010 - UNAMID’s Rule of Law-Prison Advisory section, collaborating with the UNDP and the North Darfur State Prison Authority, today continued its ongoing efforts to help improve the penal system in the state with the start of a new training program for prison employees and social workers.

The five-day workshop held in El Fasher welcomed thirty participants from various penitentiary institutions in the state. It aims at equipping them with skills on human rights approaches to basic prison duties, such as international prison standards and inmate rehabilitation and reintegration with the view to influencing them to become law abiding citizens upon release.

The workshop is facilitated by UNAMID’s substantive sections including Human Rights, Gender Advisory Unit, Medical, Child Protection and HIV/AIDS.

To date, UNAMID Rule of Law has made significant contributions towards the improvement of prisons in Darfur. Most notably, these include funding a new wing for female inmates at Shallah Federal Prison in North Darfur, the second largest in the country and launching a Legal Aid and Literacy Programme for Female Inmates at Ardamata Prison in El Geneina, West Darfur.