Delegations with representatives from ministries and authorities of sport, school, social and police sectors from Moldova, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and from 6 municipalities in Georgia met the 20th to the 22nd of November 2013 on a regional Cross Sector Juvenile Crime Prevention conference, which was funded by SIDA and held under the supervision of the Cross Cultures. OFFS Regional Branch together with OFFS Georgia had been responsible for the organization of the event.
The participants presented to each other their existing crime prevention actions and worked on the SSP Tree as a tool to analyse the targets and the types of the actions. The participants e.g. got introduced to best practice on the field of juvenile crime prevention across the countries and districts and discussed in workshops the strengths of each sector. They experienced a meeting on social exaggerations similar to the parents meetings executed in Denmark by the Danish SSP staff.
In Mtskheta – ancient capital of Georgia, the participants explored an OFFS display school with 200 children opened by the welcome speech of Mr. Tamaz Tevzadze, the Deputy Minister of Ministry of Sport and Youth Affairs of Georgia. Mr. Levan Kipiani, Minister for Sport and Youth Affairs of Georgia attended the event.
Mr. AleksandarVasilijevic, the Chief of Police Department of Serbia’s Ministry of Interior was present the three days of the conference and facilitated presentations and workshops for his colleagues in the field of crime prevention.
Ms. Eva Pastrana, project manager from the Georgian EU-Delegation, participated the first day of the conference and welcomed the Georgian stakeholders to the EU-cooperation on Cross Sector Crime Prevention.
Ms. Nino Peradze, deputy director of international department of Ministry of Interior, shared her knowledge on the juvenile crime situation in Georgia.
Mr. Beka Chulukhadze, Project Manager of the Ministry of Justice of Georgia informed the participants on the Georgian legislation on juvenile crime prevention and about the activities in the Center for Crime Prevention and Innovative Programs.
Mr. Anders Levinsen, Cross Cultures Director welcome the participants and delivered a lecture on the general tasks and aims of the OFFS+SSP project, which was going to be launched in Georgia for the first time in the OFFS history in the late November 2013. The project is funded by the EU delegation to Georgia with the aim to contribute to the implementation of the national criminal justice reforms in Georgia in the field of juvenile justice and crime prevention based on cross-sector cooperation between CSOs, schools, local government and police on municipal level for crime prevention purposes. The action is contributing to strengthen and promoting civil society organizations’ role in reforms and democratic changes in Georgia by promoting the direct involvement of community-based sport clubs and civil society networks in implementing and monitoring the national juvenile justice reforms in the area of juvenile crime prevention.
The Conference ended by a farewell dinner in Mtskheta.
