Enhancing the effectiveness of Civil Monitoring Boards in Türkiye in line with European Standards

The Civil Monitoring Boards (CMBs) have been actively involved in the external monitoring of the penitentiary system in the Republic of Türkiye through conducting on-site visits since 2001. The main task of CMBs is to conduct civil monitoring visits to the prisons and produce reports with binding recommendations for the Ministry of Justice. The deficiency of standards within the monitoring process, as well as the inadequate capacities and lack of training opportunities for the members, remained at unsatisfactory level for a long period of time.

The current “learning by doing” system should be replaced by an institutionalized training system. Therefore, there is an urgent need to work on the capacity building of the CMBs, as well as on increasing the quality of the whole process of the selection and training of its members in order to reach the European standards. Only a well-functioning external monitoring mechanism will contribute to a better penal system by decreasing the human rights breaches.

The Project was divided in 4 components:

Strengthening CMBs independence through revision of the applicable legal and regulatory framework in line with the international standards;
Enhancing CMBs efficiency by further developing their monitoring standards and working methodology and tools;
Ensuring sustainable training provision for the CMB members; and
Improving CMBs internal coordination and communication with other external monitoring mechanisms.

This Project was estimated to cover approximately 100 activities to be implemented by 31 May 2022, with an overall budget of 1,600,000 Euros.

Project documentation

Useful information

PROJECT NEWS

Back Round table on normalisation plans in Turkish prisons after the Covid-19 pandemic

The co-operation and coordination between all the mechanisms conducting monitoring visits and inspections to prisons in Turkey further improved following a round table meeting that took place on 01 March 2022.

As a result from the active contributions by all stakeholders, several concrete measures and steps to be undertaken towards the normalisation of the prison regimes and optimisation of the monitoring process were proposed. The fruitful and constructive discussions among different prison monitors proved that such meetings and exchanges of experiences significantly contribute towards better understanding of their respective role and work.

A total of 42 participants from the Civil Monitoring Boards (CMBs), Ombudsman Institution, Ministry of Justice (MoJ) Inspection Board, National Preventive Mechanism, public prosecutors, MoJ Board of Controllers and civil society organisation (CSO) representatives benefited from the presentations and discussions on the international standards and best practices, compensatory measures and normalisation trends, which will contribute to building synergies between all actors involved in prison monitoring activities.

The round table meeting was held online under the scope of the Project entitled “Enhancing the Effectiveness of the Civil Monitoring Boards in Turkey in line with the European Standards” funded by Sweden, Switzerland, the Republic of Turkey, the Human Rights Trust Fund and Canada.

Turkey 01 March 2022