A working group meeting on drafting the new National Strategy for the Development of the Penitentiary System in North Macedonia took place on 12-13 September 2019 in Skopje. The working group members shared their experience on the implementation of the current National Strategy (2015-2019), developed under a previous EU/CoE Joint Programme, and identified the shortcomings and areas for further improvement. Furthermore, the vision, mission and the layout of the National Strategy have been discussed and agreed upon, together with the specific objectives and the methodology.

The working group gathered representatives from the Directorate for Execution of Sanctions within the Ministry of Justice, prison staff from different penitentiary institutions nation-wide, as well as officials from the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy and the Ministry of Health. The meeting was facilitated by Council of Europe consultants.

This meeting is the first of a series of working sessions that was organised within the scope of the Action “Enhancing the capacities of the penitentiary system and the external oversight mechanism in North Macedonia”, co-funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe within the second phase of the “Horizontal Facility for Western Balkans and Turkey” and implemented by the Council of Europe.