ASIA PACIFIC FORUM OF NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS INSTITUTIONS Language continues to be a barrier to participation for some staff of APF member institutions. In previous years, we have run blended learning training courses in Arabic for staff of NHRIs in West Asia. In November 2014, we conducted a Bahasa-language training program for staff of the NHRIs of Indonesia, Malaysia and Timor Lester. We also translated a number of APF training manuals into Arabic. In 2014–15, the APF published the following professional development manuals: • A Manual on National Human Rights Institutions • Defending Dignity: A Manual for National Human Rights Institutions on Monitoring Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (published in partnership with the Center for Economic and Social Rights) • Promoting and Protecting Women and Girls Human Rights: A Manual for National Human Rights Institutions (Arabic version; translated by the Bahrain National Institute for Human Rights) • Promoting and Protecting Women and Girls Human Rights: A Manual for National Human Rights Institutions (Tetum version) • Promoting and Protecting the Rights of Migrant Workers: A Manual for National Human Rights Institutions (Arabic version) While evaluation data demonstrates that APF training programs help to significantly strengthen the knowledge and skills of individual participants (see Appendix 2), a key goal is to help strengthen the institutional capacity of our members to respond effectively to the human rights challenges in their countries. As part of the training programs, participants develop practical “action plans” to promote and protect the human rights under discussion, for implementation by their respective NHRIs. One way to encourage implementation of these action plans is to provide “seed funding”, as the APF committed to do as part of the 2015 training course on the human rights of women and girls for the NHRIs of South Asia (see page 21 for more information). The APF also develops training programs on selected issues for specific member institutions, where the participation of a range of NHRI staff, including decision makers, is assured. The effectiveness of this approach was demonstrated through a training program we delivered on inspecting places of detention for staff of the Office of the Ombudsman of Samoa in January 2015, which was immediately followed by inspections of six facilities across the Pacific Island nation. 14 3. Innovative approaches to building capacity: Torture Prevention Ambassadors for the Asia Pacific While the UN Convention against Torture places an absolute prohibition on torture and ill-treatment of people held in detention, there is inevitably a gap between what the law says should happen and what happens in practice. Preventing torture is about narrowing that gap. Across the Asia Pacific, staff and Commissioners from our member institutions regularly monitor places of detention, from prisons and police lock ups to immigration detention centres and closed psychiatric facilities. Their work has been crucial in driving positive changes to laws, policies, practices and community attitudes in many countries across the region. To help bolster progress in this long-term work, the APF and the Association for the Prevention of Torture jointly launched the Torture Prevention Ambassadors scheme in 2014. The aim is to encourage APF members to undertake a large-scale torture prevention project in their own country and collectively advance a torture prevention agenda within the region. APF members were invited to submit a draft project plan and nominate a candidate to participate in a competitive selection process. Nine Torture Prevention Ambassadors (six female and three male) from seven APF member institutions were selected in September 2014. The participating institutions include Australia, New Zealand, Korea, Maldives (two participants), Mongolia (two participants), the Philippines and Timor Leste. Our Torture Prevention Ambassadors include Commissioners and senior staff, all with considerable prior experience of working on or advocating for the prevention of torture. Their projects focused on promoting greater respect for the rights of people in police stations, in immigration detention and in mental health units; encouraging ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture; and strengthening the ability of national preventive mechanisms (NPMs) to build cooperative relationships and generate systemic changes in places of detention. The projects also combine different approaches and methodologies, including monitoring visits, investigations, training, capacity building and community awareness initiatives.