In the period 2017-2019 the Council of Europe supported experienced rehabilitation staff from various prisons in Serbia in developing five treatment programmes for group work with offenders in prisons, which was followed by ten 5-day peer-to-peer training sessions in 2021-2022. As a result, 207 treatment staff gained the necessary skills to deliver these treatment programmes. The training survey of each session demonstrated that the training enhanced to a great extent staff knowledge on group work with violent offenders, domestic violence offenders, drug, and alcohol abusers, but also built their confidence and capacity to independently facilitate group work.

Following the training, Heads of Treatment Departments from 27 prisons and the Special Prison Hospital met on December 07, 2022 in Belgrade to present their institutions’ progress on the implementation of the treatment programmes in the period July-December 2022. This meeting was also an excellent opportunity for the participants to hear about the results of the training of treatment officers in prisons in the past two years.

It was concluded that group treatment programmes are being delivered in all the prisons in the country, with positive feedback coming from both prisoners and programme facilitators. In their presentations, the participants uttered their determination to continue with the implementation of the programmes. During the event, the Council of Europe team also distributed to the Heads of Treatment Departments certificates for those treatment staff who participated in the training sessions.

The meeting was organised in the framework of the Project “Enhancing Human Rights Protection for Detained and Sentenced Persons in Serbia”, funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe and implemented by the Council of Europe within the framework of Horizontal Facility for Western Balkans and Turkey II.