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The follow-up
meeting on the finalization of the first draft of the Code of Conduct for Prison Administration and other issues of importance
On 3rd May 2005, Mr. Jan van den Brand, AHC represented by Mrs. Edlira Papavangjeli, Programs’ Coordinator and Director of thee project “Prison Reforms and the Role of the Civil Society in Albania” met with the General Director of Prisons in Albania, Mr. Engjëll Hysi and Ms.
Eriola Çela, Head of the Foreign Affairs Office at the General Directorate of Prisons. And later the representatives of the working group that had worked on the first draft of the Albanian Code of Conduct, Mr. Genci Shtylla, specialist at the GDP and Mrs. Belioza Çoku, Director of Social Welfare at the GDP joined this meeting.
The meeting focused first on the request which came from the General Director of Prisons to get counseling on a very important legal issue related to the draft law on the prison police and the information service within the prison area. Mr. Jan van den Brand offered the General Director his advice on
such important issues and brought the examples from other Western and Eastern Central European countries. Mr. van den Brand presented the potential risks of such services and the best practice in this regard, emphasizing that the best mechanism to prevent incidents in the prison system and fight corruption and incrimination of prison staff and at the same time guarantee the humane treatment of
the persons deprived of their liberty is to improve the cooperation of all the actors in the chain of justice system as well as the cooperation with the National Intelligence Services in Albania and prison services ssytem. This counseling session brought a different perspective to the General Director of Prisons and was very much appreciated by the Director General and his close staff.
The second topic discussed with the Director General and his staff was the need for future cooperation and the priorities of the General Directorate of Prisons for the rest of year 2005 and the first 6 months of year 2006. The General Director agreed on the following activities which can be part of the
second year of the implementation of this project:
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“Train the trainers” program with around 12 young potentials from the penitentiary institutions and from the General Directorate of Prisons who can serve as a training team to train their colleagues in the penitentiary institutions in the future. The
manual is already in place for this training. The curricula is used in many different Eastern and Central European countries members of the Council of Europe. The manual has been given to the Albanian Prison Administration high officials and they have assessed this manual as very comprehensive. The title of this training guide is “Training Guide for Prison Officials based on European Prison
Rules” covering topics like Prisons Rules, Prisoners, Staff and Organization aiming to interpret rules and how to apply these rules in managing penitentiary institutions and treating prisoners humanely ad with dignity. This program will be a four weeks training program. The experts are already available upon the approval and start of this activity.
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The Code of Conduct which will be soon approved by the Minister of Justice, needs a strategy of implementation which can start with publishing the principles of the Code of Conduct in forms of calendars to some working sessions enabling the prisons staff to
implement this National Code of Conduct;
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The arrangement of several working sessions with the prison administration of Lezha prisons (a newly opened prison with a section of high security and a section of pre-detention sites, in fact the biggest prison in size so far with 815 capacity) following
the same format as with the two pilot prisons which AHC and experts have supported in building their local strategy in managing prisons from the point of view of human rights;
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Training of pre-detention personnel, now already under the dependency of the Ministry of Justice and the GDP;
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Publications of different kinds in this area to raise the awareness of the convicts, pre-trial detainees and the prison staff on their rights and duties, as well as different audio-visual materials for training purposes of the staff;
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Continuation of the counseling sessions on issue of prisoners’ employment and the follow-up with the issues of the inspections/request and complaint procedures for the prisoners;
Note please that these are the priorities and the proposal for activities regarding the part of capacity building of prison administration and raising awareness activities both for the prisoners and the prison staff. In addition to these activities, AHC will present to the SHC monitoring
and reporting activities on the situation of the respect of the rights of pre-trial detainees and convicts.
The third topic of this meeting was the comments provided by Mr. Jan van den Brand on the work done in relation to the Albanian National Code of Conduct for the prison administration. The working group had compiled a very good draft of this code and this will be sent to the Ministry of
Justice accompanied by a letter written by Mr. Jan van den Brand to the Minister.
The
launch of the Handbook “An Approach of Human Rights to Prison Management”, 3rd May 2005
The handbook “An Approach of Human Rights to Prison Management” was translated for the first time and launched by the AHC with the financial funding of the SHC. Albanian language was the 13th language that the book was translated and target first and foremost the prison
administration dealing with pre-trial detainees and convicts in their daily activities as well to a broader target group such as policy making and decision making, legislative and executive bodies working in the area of prisons, NGOs, researchers and students interested in this area.
The objective with this activity was to contribute to capacity building of the Prison Administration in areas of institution management from the perspective of human rights standards. Participants in this special event were representatives from Ministry
of Justice, Supervising Commission on the Execution of the Penal Decisions at the Ministry of Justice, The General Directorate of Prisons, Prison Governors, Ombudsperson in Tirana, Magistrate School, NGOs working in the penitentiary area, international organisms like OSCE office in Tirana etc., AHC Members/Staff/ and Monitors.
The Deputy Minister of Justice, Mr. Anastas Duro and the General Director of Prisons, Mr. Engjëll Hysi after being introduced to the book appreciated the initiative of the AHC and thanked specially the financial support of the SHC to have the book translated
into Albanian language as well. They both emphasized that this publication will be an invaluable asset for the prison administration in general and in particular for management teams in each penitentiary institution. Then later the author of the book Mr. Andrew Coyle made an introductory speech on the handbook and its use from the part of the prison administration. The Programs’ Coordinator of
the AHC and the Director of the project “Prison Reforms and the Role of the Civil Society in Albania” Mrs. Edlira Papavangjeli, presented the audience with some of the reasons behind this initiative to translate this handbook for the Albanian target group as well.
The national media followed closely the event[1] and all the participants congratulated AHC in successfully producing this translation.
Session
introducing the Handbook on “An Approach of Human Rights to Prison Management”, 4rth May 2004
On the 4th May 2005, AHC had invited in a morning session the immediate target group, that is all Prison Governors in the Republic of Albania, the heads of the education sector of these respective penitentiary institutions, the highest officials of the General Directorate of Prisons
aiming at introducing the handbook, its main principles on prison management and the human rights standards that are the guidelines and the integral part of this publication.
The opening speeches of Mr. Engjëll Hysi, General Director of the GDP and Mrs. Edlira Papavangjeli, Programs’ Coordinator of the AHC and the speech of the moderator, Mr. Jan van den Brand, expert involved in this project highlighted from different perspectives the benefits of using
this book in the daily activities in running prisons according to all accepted international standards. Mr. Andrew Coyle, the author of this Handbook provided the participants with an insight on international developments in the prison area and the implementation of human rights standards. In his lecture[2] Mr.
Coyle, was focused on exactly two main topics: human rights and prison management. The lecture was followed with a practical guide of how to use the handbook in the daily work of the prison administration. Mr. Per Colliander focused his attention on chapter six of this handbook and analyzed and illustrated for the participants aiming at the using in practice of this book.
To sum up I would like to refer to some of the main points brought by Mr. Andrew Coyle in his speech that prisons play a very important role in the public services; while managing prisons prison administration should be guided by accepted principles; prisons should be managed within an
ethical context which respect the dignity of each person/group in prison: the prisoners, prison staff and visitors; the good management of prisons should be always seen from the perspective of human rights and values which could guarantee the social integration of persons deprived of their liberty and their rehabilitation into the society after their release.
The media covered this event extensively. More concretely, there were representatives of 7 different broadcast media such as TVA, News 24 , Neser TV, ATN 1, Vizion +, Al-Sat TV, TVSH, 2 radio channels such as Radio New Plan, Radio Tirana, 4 print media such as Koha Jone, Gazeta Albania,
Gazeta Sot, Associated Press. There was an interview given by Mrs. Edlira Papavangjeli, AHC in one of the national TV channels.
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