Ms. Belma Podrug, Executive Director of the Global Gathering Place, in Western Canada, presented on “Minority Issues on the Rise: A Canadian Prairie Perspective”, indicating that, although the ideals and principles of the Declaration were still not well known to many minorities, these principles formed the overarching basis of the organisation’s programming and activities. She pointed to the importance of making sure that minorities were consulted in the development of programmes and that their concerns formed the basis of the design of such programmes. She also underlined the importance of translating the existing legal framework into a reality on the ground, which was still a challenge for many minority groups. As a positive example, she mentioned encouraging practices within the Saskatoon’s Police forces where police officers were now required to take cultural diversity training in order to increase their sensitivity to the needs of all Canadians. This was also supported through a conscious effort by the Police to recruit cultural minorities. She also mentioned the importance of supporting national human rights institutions and ensuring that they receive adequate funding to process complaints in a reasonable time as well as the crucial role to be played by a well-established network of non-governmental organisations in the promotion and protection of minority rights. Mr Carl Soderbergh, Director of Policy and Communications with Minority Rights Group International, presented on a “Compilation of Good practices in relation to the implementation of the Declaration”, indicating that the Declaration is central to the work of MRG for at least three reasons: it provides essential guidance to the contents of Article 27 of the ICCPR on which it elaborates, its brevity makes it accessible for use by grassroots minority rights activists and the fact that the Declaration was adopted by consensus by the General Assembly gives it a particular scope. He gave a few practical examples of how the Declaration has been used by MRG, including in virtually all capacity-building training work with minority rights activists and through the translation and wide dissemination of the document into numerous languages. He also listed a few examples of how MRG’s partner organisations are using the Declaration in their work, as reported in the publication that was launched by MRG as part of its celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Declaration and entitled “Know Your Rights: a Community Guide to the UN Declaration on Minorities”. Drawing from such examples, he stressed that a few key lessons concerning civil society advocacy based on the Declaration included the importance of introducing minority communities to its principles, the value of translation and dissemination and how central training has been, as well as the usefulness of packaging the Declaration in various ways, depending on the audience, and how critical the choice of target audiences can be. Discussion The following issues were raised during the second segment of the discussion under Item IV: - The importance of data gathering, including on existing minority languages; - The advantages of developing a comprehensive national action plan; - The need to ensure the effective participation of minorities in decision-making processes as a key element for their protection; - The importance of constitution drafting process; - The need to adopt laws and regulations to strengthen the protection of minorities; - The importance of ensuring access to justice for all; 11