Youth Voice for Justice and Rights



Contract partner: TdH - Terre des Hommes Foundation, Mission in Albania Country: Albanien Funding amount: € 900.000,00 Project start: 01.07.2022 End: 30.06.2025

Short Description:

Overall goal


The overall objective of the project is to strengthen the child-friendliness of the Albanian justice system by increasing the ownership of right-holders (children and youth) and duty-bearers (law enforcement and social care professionals). This will be achieved through empowering children and youth to actively participate in child/youth led initiatives.


Expected results


1) Children and youth act as agents of change that actively participate in child/youth led initiatives at community level that focus on rule of law, democracy, human rights and environment;

2) Children and youth act as agents of change that actively participate in child/youth led initiatives at community level that focus on gender & diversity, gender roles and social norms;

3) The capacities of justice professionals are developed to provide quality services to youth offenders, victims, and witnesses during criminal proceedings.


Target group / Beneficiaries


The overall number of direct beneficiaries is 2110:

1840 children, youth (boys and girls) and adult allies,160 professionals, 60 prosecutors, judicial police officers and victims’ coordinators, 25 School of Magistrates students / justice professionals as well as 25 children (boys and girls) in contact/conflict with the law supported through case assessment and case management will directly benefit from this project.


The targeted areas are Tirana, Elbasan, Shkodra, Lezha, Kukes, Diber and Cerrik.


Activities


The following activities will be carried out, among others:

- Build capacities of local stakeholders on how to engage and ensure children/youth participation and empowerment;

- Engage children and youth groups in the targeted areas to map and analyse the situation in their local communities;

- Design youth-led local action plans to promote and ensure the child and youth participation for innovative solutions at local level with engagement of municipalities and all key duty bearers;

- Develop youth-led advocacy messages, information and awareness campaign by targeting media, local and national communities and stakeholders;

- Establish and support a "Youth Advisory Board" to ensure consultation of national and local policy and decision-making bodies;

- Design and implement capacity building manual/guidelines for justice professionals on child friendly interviewing procedures/techniques;

- Design and implement a capacity building program for prosecutors, judicial police officers and victims’ coordinators on interviewing skills for juveniles who are victims of physical or sexual abuse.


Context


In the last years in Albania, as part of national justice reform and implementation of rule of law, has undertaken very intensive steps toward the improvement of the legal framework, ensuring the full implementation of child rights both on child protection and child justice area. Since 2018 the country is implementing a New Code of Criminal Justice for Children – this encompasses a new approach that calls for systematic interventions on capacity building for professionals dealing with child justice. Additionally, it emphasizes the importance of shifting from punitive to restorative approaches by application of diversion measures, while always keeping in mind the application of best interest of the child throughout the criminal procedures. The project will - among others - build upon a strong basis on Law 18/2017 on the Rights and Protection of the Child as well as the National Agenda on Child Rights 2021-2026 which identified the need for friendly systems & participation/empowerment of children and adolescents.

project number 8372-00/2022
source of funding OEZA
sector Staatsführung & Zivilgesellschaft, allgemein
tied
modality Project-type interventions
marker Environment: 1, Gender: 1, Democracy: 2
  • Policy marker: are used to identify, assess and facilitate the monitoring of activities in support of policy objectives concerning gender equality, aid to environment, participatory development/good governance, trade development and reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health. Activities targeting the objectives of the Rio Conventions include the identification of biodiversity, climate change mitigation, climate change adaptation, and desertification.
    • 1= policy is a significant objective of the activity
    • 2= policy is the principal objective of the activity
  • Donor/ source of funding: The ADA is not only implementing projects and programmes of the Austrian Development Cooperation , but also projects funded from other sources and donors such as
    • AKF - Foreign Disaster Fund of the Austrian federal government
    • BMLFUW - Federal Ministry for Agriculture, Forestry, Environment and Water
    • EU - Funds of the European Commission
    • Others - various other donors are listed in ADA’s annual business report.
  • Type of Aid – Aid modalities: classifies transfers from the donor to the first recipient of funds such as budget support, core contributions and pooled programmes and funds to CSOs and multilateral organisations, project-type interventions, experts and other technical assistance, scholarships and student costs in donor countries, debt relief, administrative costs and other in-donor expenditures.
  • Purpose/ sector code: classifies the specific area of the recipient’s economic or social structure, funded by a bilateral contribution.
  • Tied/Untied: Untied aid is defined as loans and grants whose proceeds are fully and freely available to finance procurement from all OECD countries and substantially all developing countries. Transactions are considered tied unless the donor has, at the time of the aid offer, clearly specified a range of countries eligible for procurement which meets the tests for “untied” aid.