Council of Europe and the European Union are working together with the General Directorate of Prison Administration (GDPA) and the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Albania to further strengthen the capacities of the rehabilitation staff in its prisons, improving thus the protection of prisoners’ rights and their re-integration back into society. As part of these efforts, a 2-day online training took place with selected staff from three prisons, designated to pilot the Risk and Needs Assessment (RNA) tools for Individual Sentence Planning, namely Fier, Peqin and “Ali Demi” prisons. The training was also attended by key officials of the GDPA in order to build in-house capacities for future trainings.

The training was conceptualised as on-the-job coaching session, providing the participants with enhanced skills on unified and systematic application of the prisoner’s risk and needs assessment methodology for the purpose of developing individualised reintegration plans, therefore facilitating prisoner’s rehabilitation. It also offered insight on motivational interviewing, evidence-based data collection and progress recording, thus providing an avenue to move away from the ad hoc approach which has characterised these interventions so far.

The piloting of these tools will last up to four months with a view of extending its application to other prison facilities. A number of follow-up training sessions are planned to take place in 2021 covering rehabilitation programmes and techniques, development of daily regimes, and pre-release plans.

This activity was organised within the scope of the Action “Enhancing the protection of human rights of prisoners in Albania”, co-funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe within the “Horizontal Facility for Western Balkans and Turkey 2019-2022” and implemented by the Council of Europe.