Peace-keeping warders to meet in Kigali

Delegates from  25 countries and representatives of international organisations will gather in Kigali this weekend for a workshop that will focus on building capacity of prisons warders on international peacekeeping missions.

Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Rwandan prison warders during a past parade. The New Times/ Courtesy.

Delegates from  25 countries and representatives of international organisations will gather in Kigali this weekend for a workshop that will focus on building capacity of prisons warders on international peacekeeping missions.The two-day event which gets underway November 25, is aimed at making reforms on how to train warders for peace-keeping missions.The Deputy Commissioner General of Rwanda Correctional Services, Mary Gahonzire, told journalists that Rwanda is hosting the meeting by virtue of it being the chair of Troika, a UN-backed body aimed at providing correctional personnel to peace-keeping missions."Troika consists of three countries; Sweden, Rwanda and Canada but these countries decided to work with other countries to reach the over all goal. They were selected by the United Nations to make a change in correctional service because it is the fourth pillar in the justice system,” she said.She added that because of the good performance exhibited by these countries in other peace-keeping components of the army and police, they were entrusted by the UN in the area of  correctional services.According to Gahonzire, Rwanda besides training the prison warders, will get other benefits like showcasing its best practices to the international community.Rwanda took on the chair of Troika in July last year, during the fourth UN international corrections conference in Berlin, Germany. The chairmanship will end in 2014.