Ref: 41/2012

The Palestinian
Center for Human Rights’ (PCHR) Democratic Development Unit (DDU)
organized in May a series of workshops on media and human Rights, in
cooperation with al-Aqsa University in Gaza City.  These workshops were facilitated by Mohammed
Abu Hashem, a human rights activist, and were held in al-Aqsa Friends
Association in Gaza City, where approximately 30 university students participated.  The workshops covered the following five topics:

1. The role of the media in promoting political participation in the
Palestinian society, which was held on 13 May 2012;

2. Legitimate
restrictions on the freedom of the press,
which was held on 14 May 2012;

3. The role of the media in promoting the culture of democracy, which
was held on 16 May 2012;

4. Abolition of the death penalty under the Palestinian Authority,
which was held on 21 May 2012; and

5. The role of the media in applying the principle of transitional
justice in the Palestinian Authority, which was held on 31 May 2012.

In the same
context, on Wednesday, 30 May 2012, the DDU organized a workshop in cooperation
with Adalah Society for Arbitration in PCHR’s sub-office in Khan Yunis in the
southern Gaza Strip.  The workshop was
attended by a number of the Society’s members. 
Abu Hashem presented a working paper titled “Political
Participation between International Human Rights Law and Local Law.”

These workshops
are part of a 3-year project and funded by the European Union and Oxfam Novib,
whose goal is to improve awareness and respect of human rights in the Occupied
Palestinian Territory.  Such meetings are
part of persistent efforts made by PCHR to promote democratic awareness in the
Palestinian society under the lack of the Palestinians’ confidence in the
democratic process due to the political political and its consequences.