A/HRC/27/68
African descent. Regular training and education should be provided to people of
African descent about their legal rights and the available services;
(h)
Guidelines are adopted for the prevention, recording, investigation and
prosecution of racist or xenophobic incidents. Guidelines should guarantee that people
of African descent who are victims of acts of racism, especially women of African
descent who are victims of multiple forms of discrimination, receive proper treatment
in police stations and that complaints are recorded immediately, investigations are
pursued without delay and in an effective, independent and impartial manner, and
files relating to racist or xenophobic incidents are retained and incorporated into
databases;
(i)
People of African descent can seek protection and remedies effectively,
through the competent national tribunals and other State institutions, against any acts
of racial discrimination, and seek just and adequate reparation or satisfaction from
such tribunals for any damage suffered as a result of racial discrimination;
(j)
Judicial remedies in cases of racial discrimination are easily accessible,
prompt, impartial, affordable and geographically accessible. Law enforcement and
judicial services should have an adequate and accessible presence in the
neighbourhoods, regions, collective facilities, camps or centres where groups of people
of African descent reside, so that their complaints can be expeditiously received.
Accessible and youth-friendly reporting systems and services must be in place;
(k)
People of African descent enjoy all the guarantees of a fair trial and
equality before the law, as enshrined in the relevant international human rights
instruments, and specifically the rights to presumption of innocence, assistance of
counsel and an interpreter, an independent and impartial tribunal and guarantees of
fair punishment, and the enjoyment of all the rights to which prisoners are entitled
under the relevant international norms;
(l)
Acts of racial discrimination are prosecuted and punished and the
victims receive full reparation. The obligation to prosecute and punish should cover
all material and intellectual perpetrators of the violation. Cases of racial
discrimination must receive effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions and
remedies, both to reduce impunity and to ensure that victims can regain the dignity of
which they were deprived;
(m) Programmes are in place to provide reparatory justice for people of
African descent as victims of racial discrimination and historical injustices, including
full recognition of wrongs committed;
(n)
Measures are adopted to prevent questioning, arrests and searches
which are in reality based solely on the physical appearance of a person, that person’s
colour, features or membership of a racial or ethnic group, or any profiling which
exposes him or her to greater suspicion;
(o)
The administration of justice and the criminal justice system are subject
to permanent monitoring and adequate review in order to gauge better the existence
and extent of racial discrimination. The judicial system should adopt special measures
to recruit and promote people of African descent;
(p)
The criminalization of race is addressed, taking measures to eliminate
the overrepresentation of young people of African descent who are subject to the
criminal justice system, as well as double standards in sentencing. The racial aspects
of violence and imprisonment should be recognized;
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