Donor: Open Society Fund, Belgrade Office
Duration of project: June 2003 – February 2004
The Belgrade Centre for Human Rights, with support from the Belgrade Office of the Association of Judges in Serbia and the department branch offices of the Association of Judges in 10 Serbian cities, organised lectures by human rights experts and judges for elementary and secondary students and local municipality officials and civil servants to learn more about the human rights, the rule of law, the division of power and other institutions, particularly judicial, which would contribute to the development of legal culture in Serbia. Particular attention was paid to the role of the judiciary in building a democratic society.The project was conceived as a response to the lack of knowledge about human rights and the passivity and indifference towards social events due to the ignorance of an individual’s actual role in society. The project had the further goal of raising social awareness in order to prevent various undesirable phenomena, such as AIDS, human trafficking, sexual abuse, etc. Project participants were familiarised with major government institutions and the rights of citizens in relation to them.
Lectures were carried out in the department branch offices of the Association of Judges in the ten cities: Novi Pazar, Zaječar, Vranje, Požarevac, Obrenovac, Mladenovac, Kragujevac, Novi Sad, Zrenjanin, and Pančevo. Each Department of the Association of Judges implemented two courses, one for students and the other for local municipality officials and civil servants. Daily courses were attended by 30 – 50 local government officials and between 30 and 120 students. In total, 1200 individuals attended the courses.
The daily courses were comprised of three parts. The first part involved the general, introductory theme in order to acquaint participants with the concepts of the rule of law and human rights, with particular attention to the European Convention on Human Rights and the practice of the European Court in Strasbourg. The second part addressed the topics of judiciary and media, and lustration and corruption in the judiciary through lectures on the role of independent courts in democratic society, the role of newspapers in reforms of the justice system, the role of new criminal offenses and institutes in procedures before courts. The third part addressed themes which were most significant to the target group. The student group participated in lectures on drug addiction, juvenile justice, human trafficking, etc. The municipality official and civil servant group participated in lectures on the relationship between local government and judicial organs, institutions/procedures necessary for raising efficiency in organs concerned with administration, corruption, ombudsman, etc.
