-DHRD is a national non-governmental and non-profit organization. DHRD was established in Sulaimanya city in 2002, by several legal experts, lawyers, university instructors, and judges. The organization was formed to monitor the human rights condition in Kurdistan Region, at that time there were no such organizations in the area. 

– DHRD fully believes in establishing the rule of law and respecting human dignity and works for coexistence, and tolerance and supports forming a civil society and developing democracy and respecting human rights principles and establishing justice. 

– Since the beginning of its establishment, taking into consideration the social and economic and administrative situation DHRD worked on raising the awareness of the society about their rights. In 2006, when a series of civil protests which took place in the cities and towns of Kurdistan Region, and resulted in tension between the security forces and the protesters and the protesters were illegally arrested and violations and torture were perpetrated against the protesters, DHRD side by side with its awareness projects worked on advocating for and defending those who were tortured and illegally arrested and treated inhumanely.

– Because DHRD cares about the rule of law and the independence of the judiciary system and the condition of human rights and the detainees, it had implemented various important and strategic projects working on these topics; the most important one is the project of Supporting the Court; which includes monitoring the courts and the status of human rights and the rule of law. The project also records the human rights violations and publishes them in annual reports, in addition to various other activities. And monitoring the detentions and following up on the condition of the detainees are important components in this regard which DHRD has worked on. DHRD first started focusing on monitoring the detentions, followed by providing lawyers for the detainees who couldn’t afford a lawyer, later the services expanded to include providing legal and psychological and medical services and training the staff of the detentions on humane treatment, the human rights conventions and agreements. DHRD continues working on this topic and continues the activities under the counter-torture projects. 

– DHRD provides a range of different services to those who need such services, including legal, social, and clinical psychological services and health services to torture and gender-based violence (GBV) survivors. In addition to protecting children from violence and assaults, DHRD also provides services to detained juveniles and the juveniles who come in contact with the law. In addition to that DHRD has experience in working in humanitarian crisis contexts, and worked on refugee and internally displaced people (IDP) response in various camps. DHRD also monitors the women shelters, the courts, police stations and detentions and transfer stations, and the correction facilities to monitor the human rights condition in Kurdistan Region. 

– DHRD has awareness-raising projects, aiming at raising the legal, and psychosocial awareness of the communities and enhancing the capacity of the governmental and non-governmental service providers and the lawyers, judicial investigators, staff of the correction facilities, and human rights defenders. These projects aim at improving and elevating the quality of the services and train expert monitors to work on human rights issues at the police stations, courts, and detentions. 

– DHRD officially got registered at Baghdad in 2019, allowing the Organization to further expanded its activities and helped us to consider expanding our activities to include other parts of Iraq beyond the Kurdistan Region, where there are big needs for working on the issues that form DHRD portfolio. 

– Currently, DHRD works at numerous IDP and refugee camps, inclduing Arbat Refugee Camp, Ashty, Qoratu, and Tazade IDP camps. In addition to that DHRD works in urban locations providing legal and psychosocial services to refugees and IDPs. DHRD works with the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs at KRG providing services to the women who stay at the Shelter for Threatened Women and the correction facilities. 

Since its establishment, DHRD works on enhancing human rights principles and embodying the rule of law and strives for the independency of the courts.