16 PROMOTING AND PROTECTING MINORITY RIGHTS and covering Georgia, Azerbaijan and Armenia), Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, Ukraine and West Africa (based in Dakar). OHCHR field presences There are a number of ways in which minority rights advocates might work with the OHCHR field presences. For example, they can alert OHCHR to deteriorating human rights situations and emerging trends concerning their communities; provide information to OHCHR on local, national and regional human rights developments; work in partnership with OHCHR on human rights seminars, workshops, training programmes and projects to raise awareness of human and minority rights; help OHCHR promote the ratification of human rights treaties and their implementation; bring to the attention of OHCHR the existence of discriminatory legislation, policies and practices; work with OHCHR and other counterparts on developing technical advice, programmes and activities to address issues pertaining to minority rights; and jointly organize activities aimed at furthering the promotion and protection of minority rights, in particular promoting the implementation of the Minorities Declaration. Human rights field presences, in turn, contribute in many ways to the promotion and protection of the rights of persons belonging to minorities. The focus and content of such contributions vary, but may include, for example: • Ensuring that specific attention is paid to the situation of minority groups in all monitoring activities; • Identifying challenges to the realization of human rights by minorities in local contexts and working towards finding solutions; • Identifying and addressing gaps in the protection of rights to which minorities are entitled; • Ensuring that laws relating to minority rights and related issues are consistent with international human rights standards, including the Minorities Declaration, and that these standards are fully reflected in legislative initiatives; • Encouraging the collection and analysis of data disaggregated along ethnic, religious and gender lines in order to better inform policymaking; • Facilitating dialogue between minorities and Government officials at the central and local levels, including creating country-specific consultative structures for minorities where they do not presently exist; • Working with minority advocates and other stakeholders towards the implementation of recommendations issued by human rights treaty bodies and special procedures, and those developed within the universal periodic review process, including facilitating their translation into local and minority languages; • Working with the media towards more inclusive and unbiased reporting regarding minorities; • Suggesting programmes and actions to enable minorities to express and develop their culture, language, religion, traditions and customs; • Helping to ensure that persons belonging to minority groups have access to information relating to public policies and decisions that affect them, and facilitating the participation of minorities in decision-making; • Facilitating dialogue with minority groups at the national, regional and local government levels; • Facilitating capacity-building and networks for exchange of information and coordination of activities among minority rights advocates;