Police Reform

The OSCE Conference “10th Anniversary of the OSCE Action Plan for the Promotion of Gender Equality”

There was a Review Conference on the occasion of the 10th Anniversary of the 2004 OSCE Action Plan for the Promotion of Gender Equality in the Hofburg Congress Centre premises (Vienna, Austria) from 10 to 11 July 2014. The Action Plan is a key OSCE document on gender equality issues. The conference brought together national stakeholders not only from the government and academia, but also from the civil society. 

At the conference the Republic of Tajikistan (RT) was represented by a delegation chaired by the Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the RT, Major General Umarzoda Ikrom, who made a presentation during the second day of conference on "Combating Violence against Women."

In his speech, Mr. Umarzoda noted that Tajikistan as the OSCE participating State undertakes all efforts to implement the OSCE Action Plan on mainstreaming gender equality. He has referred to comprehensive state policy on gender and outlined the legal framework of Tajikistan in this direction.

The Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the RT stressed that in 2012 Tajikistan has adopted a Law on Domestic Violence Prevention, which was followed by amendments to the respective legal statutes. According to him “recently the Government of Tajikistan has endorsed the State Program on Prevention of Violence in the Family. At the same time, the Parliamentary Consultative Group continues to work on developing legal implementation mechanisms of the Law on Prevention of Violence in the Family.”

Mr. Umarzoda noted that capacity building of women in the political- military dimension is a key prerequisite for comprehensive security. Tajik law enforcement agencies play a key role in prevention and prosecution of domestic violence. Currently, there are five specialized police departments on prevention of domestic violence and 16 crisis centers operating in the field of domestic violence prevention and providing assistance to victims of domestic violence. The special courses on prevention and prosecution of domestic violence were incorporated to the curriculum of the Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) of the RT. Although a lot of females work in the police, the MIA will elaborate special mechanisms for further development of gender balance in the law enforcement agencies.