Financial Support for Litigation Workshops
Deadline: Rolling deadline (we will continue to accept new applications until all available spots have been filled).
REDRESS is inviting applications for financial partnerships to support strategic litigation against torture, particularly in the context of dissent and discrimination. This support is through the United Against Torture Consortium, which is funded by the European Union
The United Against Torture consortium brings together the global memberships of the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (IRCT) and the International Federation of Action by Christians for the Abolition of Torture (FIACAT) with the Association for the Prevention of Torture (APT), Omega Research Foundation and REDRESS. The consortium works in partnership with national civil society organisations and other partners worldwide to build a global movement. The three-year project will focus on providing direct assist thousands of torture survivors, and strengthening local staff capacity to advocate with national actors responsible for torture prevention and rehabilitation. Survivors’ experiences and, for those who wish, their direct participation is at the centre of the consortium’s torture prevention, rehabilitation and justice processes, both nationally and internationally.
Torture in the context of dissent relates to the use of torture to crush protest and activism. Targeting among others lawyers, human rights defenders, journalists, and protestors, torture in the context of dissent manifests in the form of, for example, police brutality against protesters and activists, forced disappearances of activists. The use and threat of torture against those who dissent closes down civil society space, creating an atmosphere of fear, making it even more difficult to hold governments to account.
Torture in the context of discrimination relates to the use and threat of torture against minority groups, knowing that they maybe be powerless to respond. Torture in the context of discrimination is often used to silence and oppress marginalised and excluded communities
Call for applications: Financial support for Litigation workshops
This call for applications will support litigation workshops in support of strategic litigation cases of torture in the context of dissent and discrimination in Africa.
Litigation workshops have been developed over the last 30 years as a human rights methodology to brainstorm individual cases of strategic litigation, share experiences, and produced a concrete litigation plan. REDRESS has further developed this methodology in anti-torture field with guidance on litigation workshops that can be adopted and modified to the context. Applicants are encouraged to review the Practice Note: Facilitating Litigation Workshops. This practice note shares the experience of REDRESS running litigation workshops for cases of torture and other serious human rights violations, including enforced disappearance. It is intended to provide guidance on what works best to assist those facilitating this type of workshop, both online and in person. Facilitators are free to try out other styles and methods, as well as to adapt these guidelines to the specific context they are working in.
Information on Financial Support:
- Under this call for applications, you can apply for financial support up to €7,000 Euros
- No individual project will be supported for longer than 6 months
Eligibility Criteria
The call for application is primarily aimed at anti-torture non-governmental organisations. Therefore, to be considered an applicant must:
- Be a legally registered or constituted organisation
- Be a not-for profit or charitable organisation
- Have proof of incorporation or registration with the relevant national authority
- Have a mandate and experience relating to challenging torture.
What we are not able to support
- Workshops that are not in support of strategic litigation cases of torture in the context of dissent and discrimination in Africa
- For profit organisations
- Individuals, including individual student scholarships, or airfares, or attendance at overseas conferences.
- On-going funding of applicant’s operational or organisational costs such as wages and salaries, office items and communications (core support)
How to apply:
Please send your applications by email to [email protected].