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States News Service
November 13, 2014 Thursday
LAW STUDENTS COMPETE TO SUPPORT ALTERNATIVES TO PRISON IN ARMENIA,
AZERBAIJAN AND GEORGIA
NEW YORK, NY
The following information was released by the United Nations Democracy Fund:
An UNDEF-funded project for penal reform in Armenia, Azerbaijan and
Georgia held an essay and presentation competition for law students to
increase awareness of alternatives to imprisonment, reflect on
challenges of existing criminal justice policy,and advance
professional interest in building a probation system, currently
non-existent in Armenia, Azerbaijan. The contest asked participants to
think about new approaches to working for greater use of community
service and other options, demonstrate critical thinking on the low
application of alternatives to imprisonment, and provide reasonable
arguments to enable lobbying of the ideas before governmental bodies.
The competition judges included representatives of the Council of
Europe, the Ministry of Justice of Armenia, the International
Federation for Human Rights, the National Probation Agency of Georgia,
the Georgian Center for Psychosocial and Medical Rehabilitation of
Torture Victims, as well as human rights lawyers and academics from
leading universities, and the award ceremonies took place in Yerevan
and Tbilisi in October 2014. The goal of the overall project is to
promote the effective use of non-custodial and early release measures
to challenge the overuse of imprisonment, help decrease in the prison
population and build proportionate responses to crime. The project
works to help develop a probation system in Armenia and Azerbaijan --
including through capacity-building and lessons learned from Georgia,
which does have a probation service.Penal Reform International South
Caucacus is implementing the project in partnership with the Civil
Society Institute of Armenia and the Human Rights Center of
Azerbaijan.
November 13, 2014 Thursday
LAW STUDENTS COMPETE TO SUPPORT ALTERNATIVES TO PRISON IN ARMENIA,
AZERBAIJAN AND GEORGIA
NEW YORK, NY
The following information was released by the United Nations Democracy Fund:
An UNDEF-funded project for penal reform in Armenia, Azerbaijan and
Georgia held an essay and presentation competition for law students to
increase awareness of alternatives to imprisonment, reflect on
challenges of existing criminal justice policy,and advance
professional interest in building a probation system, currently
non-existent in Armenia, Azerbaijan. The contest asked participants to
think about new approaches to working for greater use of community
service and other options, demonstrate critical thinking on the low
application of alternatives to imprisonment, and provide reasonable
arguments to enable lobbying of the ideas before governmental bodies.
The competition judges included representatives of the Council of
Europe, the Ministry of Justice of Armenia, the International
Federation for Human Rights, the National Probation Agency of Georgia,
the Georgian Center for Psychosocial and Medical Rehabilitation of
Torture Victims, as well as human rights lawyers and academics from
leading universities, and the award ceremonies took place in Yerevan
and Tbilisi in October 2014. The goal of the overall project is to
promote the effective use of non-custodial and early release measures
to challenge the overuse of imprisonment, help decrease in the prison
population and build proportionate responses to crime. The project
works to help develop a probation system in Armenia and Azerbaijan --
including through capacity-building and lessons learned from Georgia,
which does have a probation service.Penal Reform International South
Caucacus is implementing the project in partnership with the Civil
Society Institute of Armenia and the Human Rights Center of
Azerbaijan.