In view of the continuous assistance to harmonise the judicial practice in Albania, the European Union (EU) and Council of Europe (CoE) supported a virtual exchange of experiences between the High Court (HC) staff and legal advisors with their peers from England and Wales, France, Portugal and Serbia.

The event aimed to address some of the structural weaknesses of the Albanian judicial system assessed in the context of the EU/CoE assistance in 2020. It focused on strengthening the research and documentation practices and better use of European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) case-law, thus providing a basis for the unification of the judicial practice in the entire justice system.

The staff and legal advisors of the High Court had the opportunity to hear the experience of senior legal practitioners from the above-mentioned countries on the functioning of the documentation structures and dissemination of the court decisions in the respective High Courts. They provided meaningful examples of how documentation, research and publications are supporting the High Court’s abilities to fulfil its tasks and legal obligations.

Exchanges were further extended on the role of the wider community of practitioners, including in the courts of appeals and first instance, academia, civil society and media, in the harmonisation of domestic practice, nurturing the legal debate on due application of legislation and the establishment of legal databases for courts’ and public use.

The activity was organised in the framework of the action “Supporting enforcement of the judicial decisions and facilitating the execution of ECtHR judgements in Albania” under “Horizontal Facility for the Western Balkans and Turkey II”, a co-operation initiative co-funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe and implemented by the Council of Europe, which aims at assisting beneficiaries in South-East Europe to comply with the Council of Europe standards and European Union acquis in the framework of the enlargement process.