Sudan making efforts to improve human rights situation – spokesman

June 24, 2013, (KHARTOUM) – Sudan’s minister of information and the government spokesperson, Ahmed Bilal Osman, has asserted the government’s keen desire to improve the human rights situation in the country particularly with regards to press freedom.

Bilal, who was addressing a training session on human rights protection organized by Sudan’s National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Geneva Institute for Human Rights (GIHR), and the journalists’ union in Khartoum yesterday emphasized that the government is all for objectivity, openness, and freedoms adding that press is an integral and essential component of democracy.

He said that wars forced upon Sudan made human rights at the center of the agenda targeting the country by external forces pointing to the possibility of arriving at a compromise to overcome this situation.

The Swiss embassy in Khartoum, for its part, affirmed its commitment to offer support and training for Sudanese people on human rights issues.

The Swiss ambassador pointed out that his embassy supports the framework project for human rights in Sudan, saying that this year they have funded two projects on human rights culture in Darfur and South Kordofan.

The head of the NHRC, Amal Al-Tinai, affirmed their determination to fully play their role with impartiality and in accordance with the constitution, saying that they would be the watchful eye on human rights in Sudan.

Over the last year the government has cracked down on several newspapers and think tanks going as far as closing some of then indefinitely.

Furthermore, Sudanese security exercised pre-publication censorship on newspapers until the measure was lifted last month by 1st VP Ali Osman Taha.

(ST)