The ombudsman can support and cooperate with civil society organizations with objectives similar to those of the specialized body. They can include providing information and advice to relevant bodies and institutions, and counseling actors about specific issues including anti-discriminatory standards and practice. The office can facilitate training initiatives by bodies such as the Council of Europe, assisting civil society organizations to contribute to state reports on minority issues and writing their own shadow reports. PART I can use the ombudsman’s report to identify the key issues and have those issues placed in an objective context. Conversely, the Advisory Committee may be able to support the ombudsman’s concerns by raising the issues in their Opinion. The Paris Principles set out that the institution shall contribute to the reports which states are required to submit to UN bodies and committees and to regional institutions, pursuant to that state’s treaty obligations. In a number of countries an ombudsman plays a facilitating role, bringing together civil society and government to enter into discussion on areas of mutual concern in a neutral and trusted environment. These may be through conferences, seminars, workshops or on occasion private discrete discussions on sometimes controversial policy issues that need resolution. This may also involve joint training sessions or separate training programmes. The ombudsmen can help bring relevant parties together to meet international or domestic experts to discuss complex issues and, like many already, hold private meetings themselves with visiting treaty monitoring bodies, including the Advisory Committee. Ombudsmen have helped convene meetings with the Advisory Committee as it has been visiting a country before formulating its Opinion. Additionally, after the Opinion has been formed, ombudsmen have helped in convening roundtables to enable discussions to take place between government officials, minority organizations and the Council of Europe. There are a wide range of ways of reaching the diverse audiences that the ombudsman may want to approach on a variety of issues. It is important to be clear about the objectives and the audience before media are selected. Media may include private conversations, workshops, seminars, conferences, radio broadcasts, leaflets, brochures, reports, books, posters, advertising, television broadcasts and the internet inter alia. It is always important to be sensitive to the audience to ensure that messages can go well beyond the capital to the distant parts of the country, to use messages that are appropriate to the audience, sensitive to different levels of education, understanding and literacy and which are in understandable language. Timing can also be relevant as the same statement made at different times can come across very differently depending on the changed circumstances. 37