THOMSON REUTERS CORP 
By Paris, 14 November 2011 - The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Thomson Reuters and Freedom Now, which advocates on behalf of illegally detained prisoners of conscience, have joined forces to establish a database containing publicly available opinions of the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on cases of arbitrary detention worldwide.
The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention Document Search database, accessed at unwgaddatabase.org, features more than 650 opinions from the Working Group and will continue to be updated as new legal opinions are issued. This database, which was created and is hosted by Thomson Reuters, is seen as a key resource in supporting advocacy work and protecting the human rights of individuals detained for their political, religious, or other beliefs or because of their ethnic origin, sex or sexual orientation.
El Hadji Malick Sow, chair-rapporteur of the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, said that over the 20-year history of the Working Group, these opinions were not centralized on or searchable through a database, limiting their value for legal research or for promoting human rights. "The database is a key instrument for our work in consideration of new cases of alleged arbitrary deprivation of liberty."
Opinions from the Working Group are beneficial in demonstrating support and advancing respect of human rights throughout the world. The database will enable members of the Working Group to use the opinions in its official country visits, as well as in their everyday duties, to promote human rights more effectively, generate additional support and public awareness, and support the overarching goals of the OHCHR.
Maran Turner, executive director, Freedom Now, said making the opinions accessible to the public will support legal advocacy for individuals believed to be illegally detained in violation of their human rights. "As an organization that utilizes the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention mechanism and values the contribution this body makes to international human rights, we are thrilled to work with the United Nations and Thomson Reuters in developing this amazing resource," she said. "The database will make the Working Group's body of legal decisions much more accessible, thus permitting petitioners to easily research prior decisions and incorporate documented legal reasoning into their own petitions. I believe this database will raise the profile of the Working Group as an important avenue for challenging illegal detentions around the world."
Highlighting each opinion written by the Working Group since 1992, the database features keyword search capability, and offers advanced search methods as well. The opinions can be searched by selecting specific human rights articles or instruments, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) Article 9: prohibition of arbitrary detention, and also by country, Working Group decision categories, UN document numbers, government responses, date ranges and more.
Thomson Reuters supports social justice and legal pro-bono work, as well as rule of law initiatives in emerging democracies, and the company's Westlaw service is used by legal professionals and government agencies around the world. Freedom Now facilitated the creation of the database, processed the opinions for keywords and tags, and continues to assist in the functionality of the database. The database is available in English, French and Spanish and was built on a website platform provided by Ektron, a global leader in content management and social software.
Contacts
Jeffrey McCoy
Manager, External Communications
Tel: +1 651 687 4091
Email
