Justice and Peace Commission (JPC).
The Justice and Peace Commission (JPC) was founded in 1991 with the sole purpose of monitoring the fragile peace right after the first ceasefire signed between the Government and rebels in Liberia. JPC has since expanded its work to address issues regarding social, economic, political and religious justice as well as respect for human rights.
The organisation bases its work on three overall objectives: to discover and make public human rights abuses and violations; to promote respect for human rights, democracy, justice, and peace; and to promote dialogue, tolerance, and co-existence among all sections of Liberian society.
In the area of human rights, they have a programme designed to create a human rights conscious and strong civil society movement to confront the long culture of silence over human rights abuses. The JPC is directly engaged in the monitoring, investigating, documentation and reporting of human rights abuses and violations.
In terms of access to justice, the organisation provides free legal service to the disadvantaged whose rights are violated, but do not have the means to acquire legal redress. Via their prison visitation and assistance program, the JPC reviews the terms and duration of detention, the health and general physical condition of inmates and the overall condition of prison institutions and provides services where needed.
A key part of the work of the JPC is to conduct conflict resolution and peacebuilding training and workshops at a community level, in order to promote non-violence as a method for resolving conflicts.
