Title MULTI COUNTRY EVALUATION OF THE - UNICEF · 2019-11-22 · Multi-country evaluation of the impact of juvenile justice system reforms on children in conflict with the law (2006-2012)

MULTI-COUNTRY EVALUATION OF THE

IMPACT OF JUVENILE JUSTICE SYSTEM REFORMS

ON CHILDREN IN CONFLICT WITH THE LAW

(2006-2012)

UNICEF Regional Office for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia

FINAL REPORT

AUGUST 2015

Prepared by: Dr Adam Novák

With input from: F. Ballarin, G. Caraseni, D. Crnjanski, S. Cifarelli, B. Hasanpapaj, R. Iskandarli, M. Leskoviku,

M. Moore, J. Moyersoen, Y. Pavlova, A. Sagynbaeva, M. Tomankova, T. Trapaidze, R. Ziganshin and editing

support provided by Professor Carolyn Hamilton.

Title

Multi-country evaluation of the impact of juvenile justice system reforms on children in conflict with the law (2006-2012)

Final Report Version 4.0 Page 2

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS ............................................................................................................. 7

2. Executive Summary ................................................................................................................................... 9

3. BACKGROUND SCOPE AND OBJECTIVES OF THE JUVENILE JUSTICE PROGRAMMES AND THE EVALUATION 18

3.1. BACKGROUND AND REGIONAL CONTEXT ................................................................................... 18

3.2. THE OBJECTIVE OF THE EVALUATION .......................................................................................... 20

3.3. COUNTRY SELECTION ................................................................................................................... 22

3.4. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ........................................................................................................ 22

3.4.1. Theory of change ........................................................................................................................ 22

3.5. THE ‘EFFECTS DIAGRAM’ ............................................................................................................. 24

3.6. STAKEHOLDERS ............................................................................................................................ 25

4. METHODOLOGY ....................................................................................................................................... 27

4.1. THE EVALUATION PROCESS ......................................................................................................... 27

4.2. METHODOLOGY AND TOOLS ....................................................................................................... 29

4.3. CHALLENGES AND LIMITATIONS .................................................................................................. 30

5. FINDINGS OF THE EVALUATION ............................................................................................................... 32

5.1. TO WHAT EXTENT HAVE THE RESULTS OF (1) REDUCING DETENTION FOR CHILDREN IN CONFLICT WITH THE LAW, (2) INCREASING THE USE OF DIVERSION FROM THE JUDICIAL PROCESS AND (3) REDUCING THE AVERAGE DURATION OF PRE-SENTENCE DETENTION BEEN ACHIEVED IN EACH OF THE COUNTRY OVER THE PERIOD 2006—2012? ............................................................................................ 32

5.1.1. Result 1: A decline in detention for children in conflict with the law ........................................ 32

5.1.2. Declining number of children in pre-trial detention ................................................................... 35

5.1.3. Declining use of custodial sentences .......................................................................................... 36

5.1.4. Detention by type of facility ....................................................................................................... 38

5.1.5. Result 2: Increased use of diversion from the judicial process ................................................... 38

5.1.6. Result 3: A decline in the duration of pre-sentence detention .................................................. 41

5.1.7. Stakeholders’ perceptions of trends in the above indicators ..................................................... 43

5.2. TO WHAT EXTENT HAVE THE ABOVE THREE RESULTS DIFFERENTLY AFFECTED (1) BOYS AND GIRLS, (2) VARIOUS AGE GROUPS (UNDER 14; 14-15; 16-17) AND (3) THE MOST VULNERABLE GROUPS OF CHILDREN, INCLUDING THOSE FROM ETHNIC MINORITIES OR FROM FAMILIES WITH LOWER INCOME OR IN DIFFICULT CIRCUMSTANCES? ........................................................................................................ 44

5.2.1. Detention by gender ................................................................................................................... 44

5.2.2. Detention by age ......................................................................................................................... 45

5.2.3. Vulnerable groups ....................................................................................................................... 46

5.3. HOW RELEVANT WAS UNICEF’S APPROACH TO JUVENILE JUSTICE (AT REGIONAL AND COUNTRY LEVELS) IN MEETING THE NEEDS AND PROMOTING THE RIGHTS OF THE MOST VULNERABLE? ........... 46

5.3.1. How comprehensive was UNICEF’s situation analysis? .............................................................. 46

5.3.2. Vulnerability and marginalisation issues within UNICEF’s programme design .......................... 47

5.3.3. Operational definitions of the ‘marginalised’ and ‘socially vulnerable’ ..................................... 48



5.4. TO WHAT EXTENT WERE UNICEF’S JUVENILE JUSTICE INTERVENTIONS RELEVANT TO THE BROADER RULE OF LAW AND JUSTICE SECTOR REFORM AGENDAS IMPLEMENTED BY GOVERNMENTS, THE EU, BILATERAL DONORS, THE UN AND OTHER ACTORS? ................................................................. 49

5.4.1. Stakeholder perception of the relevance of juvenile justice reforms in their countries and territories ................................................................................................................................................. 49

5.4.2. UNICEF alignment with donors ................................................................................................... 50

5.5. TO WHAT EXTENT HAS THE REFORM PROCESS SUPPORTED BY UNICEF CONTRIBUTED TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF SPECIALIZED JUVENILE JUSTICE SYSTEMS IN LINE WITH INTERNATIONAL AND EUROPEAN STANDARDS? ........................................................................................................................ 52

5.6. TO WHAT EXTENT HAVE DETERMINANTS CONTRIBUTED TO OR IMPEDED. IMPACT ON THE NUMBER OF CHILDREN IN DETENTION, THE USE OF DIVERSION AND THE DURATION OF PRE-SENTENCE DETENTION .............................................................................................................................................. 52

5.6.1. Enabling environment ................................................................................................................. 52

5.6.2. Supply .......................................................................................................................................... 58

5.6.3. Demand ....................................................................................................................................... 60

5.6.4. Quality ......................................................................................................................................... 64

5.7. DETERMINANTS AND THE THEORY OF CHANGE ......................................................................... 66

5.7.1. Impact depends on multiple results ........................................................................................... 67

5.7.2. A sub-group of determinants are strongly associated with the results ..................................... 67

5.7.3. Some determinants become increasingly relevant in later stages of juvenile justice reform ... 67

5.7.4. Some determinants have a limited or indirect impact on the results ........................................ 68

5.7.5. Some core roles make a minor or indirect contribution to the determinants ........................... 68

5.7.6. Some terms and concepts used by UNICEF and related to the Theory of Change are not clear 69

5.7.7. Only factors that must be in place before UNICEF begins juvenile justice programming should be identified as preconditions in the Theory of Change .............................................................................. 69

5.8. HOW HAVE THE DETERMINANTS INTERACTED WITH EACH OTHER DURING THE REFORM PROCESS (E.G. ARE SOME DETERMINANTS PRE-REQUISITES TO THE PRESENCE OF OTHERS OR ARE SOME DETERMINANTS EFFECTIVE ONLY IF COMBINED WITH OTHERS)? .......................................................... 69

5.9. WERE THERE EXTERNAL FACTORS – I.E. NOT RELATED TO THE REFORM PROCESS IN ITSELF – THAT HAVE INFLUENCED POSITIVELY OR NEGATIVELY THE NUMBER OF CHILDREN IN DETENTION, THE USE OF DIVERSION AND THE DURATION OF PRE-SENTENCE DETENTION? ......................................................... 70

5.10. TO WHAT EXTENT HAS UNICEF BEEN ENGAGED IN EACH OF THE DETERMINANTS; WERE SOME OF THE DETERMINANTS ADDRESSED MORE OR LESS THAN OTHERS AND WHY? .................................. 71

5.11. WERE SUFFICIENT RESOURCES (FINANCIAL AND HUMAN) INVESTED IN THE REFORM OR LEVERAGED TO ACHIEVE THE THREE SELECTED RESULTS? ..................................................................... 74

5.11.1. Adequacy of resources invested/fundraised by UNICEF for Juvenile Justice related work ....... 74

5.12. HOW EFFICIENTLY MANAGED AND COORDINATED WERE THE RESOURCES (FINANCIAL AND HUMAN) INPUTTED INTO THE REFORM BY UNICEF ................................................................................ 76

5.12.1. UNICEF perceptions of the adequacy of staffing and management structure ........................... 76

5.12.2. Regional office guidance and support ........................................................................................ 77

5.13. TO WHAT EXTENT WERE THE FOLLOWING UNICEF ROLES/STRATEGIES PARTICULARLY EFFICIENT TO ACHIEVE THE RESULTS? ...................................................................................................................... 78



5.13.1. Policy advice and technical assistance ........................................................................................ 82

5.13.2. Being the voice for children ........................................................................................................ 82

5.13.3. Child rights monitoring and evaluation ...................................................................................... 83

5.13.4. Leveraging resources from the public and private sector .......................................................... 85

5.13.5. Enabling knowledge exchange .................................................................................................... 88

5.13.6. Modelling/piloting ...................................................................................................................... 90

5.13.7. Ensuring proper internal controls and risk management ........................................................... 91

5.14. TO WHAT EXTENT HAVE THE REGIONALLY-LED INITIATIVES, SUCH AS THE ‘CRITICAL MASS’ EXERCISE AND THE REGIONAL COMPONENT OF THE EIDHR PROJECT, CONTRIBUTED TO INFLUENCING THE DETERMINANTS AND IMPACTING ON CHILDREN? .......................................................................... 91

5.15. SUSTAINABILITY: TO WHAT EXTENT HAVE THE CONCERNED GOVERNMENTS OWNED THE JUVENILE JUSTICE REFORM PROCESS AND COMMITTED TO SUSTAIN IT? .............................................. 93

5.16. TO WHAT EXTENT HAVE THE CONCERNED GOVERNMENTS AND NATIONAL NGOS THE CAPACITY TO SUSTAIN THE JUVENILE JUSTICE REFORM PROCESS? ........................................................................ 95

6. CONCLUSIONS .......................................................................................................................................... 99

7. RECOMMENDATIONS ............................................................................................................................ 104

VOLUME 2: ANNEXES

ANNEX 1: TERMS OF REFERENCE

ANNEX 2: THEORY OF CHANGE

ANNEX 3: LOGICAL FRAMEWORK FOR EIDHR/UNICEF PROJECTS CEE-CIS

ANNEX 4: EVALUATION MATRIX

ANNEX 5: BIBLIOGRAPHY

ANNEX 6: GLOSSARY

ANNEX 7: LIST OF STAKEHOLDERS BY COUNTRY

ANNEX 8: MAPPING OF INTERVENTIONS – COUNTR AND REGIONAL LEVEL

ANNEX 9: SURVEYS: TEXT AND DATA

ANNEX 10: ADDITIONAL DATA

ANNEX 11: APPROACH AND METHODOLOGICAL TOOLS



List of tables

Table 1: The objectives and expected results of the EIHDR/UNICEF Project ..................................................................... 20

Table 2: Reducing detention for children in conflict with the law..................................................................................... 33

Table 3: Number of juveniles in pre-sentence/pre-trial detention .................................................................................... 35

Table 4: Number of juveniles detained in post-sentencing detention facilities ................................................................ 36

Table 5: Children in detention by type of facility .............................................................................................................. 38

Table 6: Increase in the use of diversion from judicial proceedings .................................................................................. 39

Table 7: Percentage of children who enter a pre-sentence diversion scheme as a percentage of children accused of a crime ................................................................................................................................................................................. 39

Table 8: Average duration of pre-sentence detention ...................................................................................................... 41

Table 9: Average length of pre-sentence juvenile detention in days ................................................................................ 42

Table 10: EU financial support to juvenile justice reform in the nine ENPI and DCI countries covered by this evaluation .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 50

Table 11: Change in Practitioner Perception of change in support for reintegration ....................................................... 53

Table 12: Training events relevant to juvenile justice ....................................................................................................... 53

Table 13: Legislation and Policy Change Regarding Young Offenders .............................................................................. 55

Table 15: Change in operational coordination mechanisms ............................................................................................. 58

Table 16: Change in staff services relevant to juvenile justice .......................................................................................... 59

Table 17: Practitioner perception of change in capacity to access free legal services...................................................... 61

Table 18: Change in social and cultural practices ............................................................................................................. 63

Table 19: Practitioner perception of change in adherence to required quality of services ............................................... 65

Table 20: UNICEF juvenile justice interventions in the 11 CEE/CIS countries – 2006-2012 ............................................... 74

Table 21: UNICEF staff perceptions of resources invested/levered................................................................................... 77

Table 22: Change in practitioner attitude towards the use of reintegration .................................................................... 87

List of figures

Figure 1: Regional Theory of Change for UNICEF’s Juvenile Justice Reform Initiative in Eastern Europe and Central Asia .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 26

Figure 3: Data collection process in desk and field phases ............................................................................................... 30

Figure 4: Comparison of detention trend with change in juvenile population .................................................................. 34

Figure 5: Annual change in number of children in pre- and post-sentencing detention (only for years where data is available) .......................................................................................................................................................................... 35

Figure 6: Children serving custodial sentences as % of all convicted children in the region ............................................. 37

Figure 7: Percentage of convicted children serving custodial sentences .......................................................................... 37

Figure 8: Percentage of children diverted from court (eight countries and territories) .................................................... 40

Figure 9: Ratio of children who enter a diversion scheme, in comparison with number of children who are convicted (country trends) ................................................................................................................................................................ 41

Figure 10: Annual change in length of pre-sentence juvenile detention (only for years where data is available) ........... 42

Figure 11: EU project-based funding of UNICEF in 9 selected ENPI and DCI countries ..................................................... 51

Figure 12: Percentage of UNICEF projects associated with each determinant ................................................................. 72



Figure 13: Proportion of activities addressing each MoRES component .......................................................................... 73

Figure 14: Country Offices’ assessment of UNICEF’s contribution to the system level changes associated with Juvenile Justice. .............................................................................................................................................................................. 74

Figure 15: Distribution of financial resources per determinant ........................................................................................ 76

Figure 16: UNICEF Country Office staff assessment of impact of Regional Office on Core Roles ..................................... 78

Figure 17: The proportion of UNICEF juvenile justice budget and activities allocated to the roles/strategies ................. 79

Figure 18: Stakeholder perceptions of UNICEF impact through its core roles .................................................................. 80

Figure 19: Stakeholder perceptions of UNICEF CO core roles ........................................................................................... 81



Acronym Description

AWP Annual Work Plan

CCA Common Country Assessment

CEDEM Centre for Democracy and Human Rights

CEE/CIS Central and Eastern Europe/the Commonwealth of Independent States

CNPAC National Centre for Child Abuse Prevention

CO Country Office

COE Council of Europe

CPT Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or

Punishment

CJC Community Justice Centre

CPAP Country Programme Action Plan

CPC Criminal Procedure Code

CPD Country Programme Document

CRC Convention on the Rights of the Child

DAC Development Assistance Committee

DCI Development Cooperation Instrument

DER Draft Evaluation Report

DEVCO EC Directorate General Development and Cooperation

EAR European Agency for reconstruction

EC European Commission

EIDHR European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights

ENOC European network of children’s ombudsmen

ENPI European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument

EQ Evaluation Question

EU European Union

EUD European Union Delegation

EUR Euro

INSTAT National Statistics Institute

IPA Instrument for Pre-Accession

IR Inception Report

MCE Multi Country Evaluation

M&E Monitoring and Evaluation

MoJ Ministry of Justice

MORES Monitoring Results for Equity System

MOLSW Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare

NGO Non-Governmental Organisation

ODA/OA Official development assistance / Official Aid

OECD Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

OSCE Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

RKLA Regional Knowledge and Leadership Agenda

RG Reference Group

1. ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS

http://www.acronymfinder.com/Central-and-Eastern-Europe-and-the-New-Independent-States-(CEE%2fNIS).html



Acronym Description

RO Regional Office for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia

RWP Multi Year Work Plan

SAA Stabilisation and Association Agreement

SIDA Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency

TA Technical assistance

TOC Theory of Change

ToR Terms of Reference

UNEG United Nations Evaluation Group

UN-HRC United Nations Human Rights Council

UN- HRI United Nation International Human Rights

UNICEF United Nations Children's Fund

UNDAF United Nations Development Assistance Framework

UNDP United National Development Programme

UNODC United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

UNCRC United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child

UPR Universal Periodic Review

WHO World Health Organization



2. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

2.1 Background

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) requires States to promote the establishment of laws, policies, procedures institutions and services specifically applicable to children who are alleged as, accused of or recognised as having infringed the criminal law.1 More specifically, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child requires that States parties establish a juvenile justice system, whose principal aim is to reintegrate children into their communities and society.2 The juvenile justice systems in countries and territories of CEE/CIS, which shared a common legal background until independence at the beginning of the 90s, focused on punishment rather than reintegration, and on prosecution and detention rather than on diversion from judicial proceedings and the various community-based alternative to custody that can best support the reintegration of young people in conflict with the law. None of the countries or territories in the CEE/CIS region have a juvenile justice system that fully meets the standard set by the CRC and other UN international standards and norms.

UNICEF country offices have gradually started working on juvenile justice in the CEE/CIS region in 2000, with most of them active in this area by 2006. In addition to specific country-based support to reforms, there have been two initiatives led by the UNICEF Regional Office. The first, the ‘critical mass’ exercise started in 2008, and aimed at encouraging a group of CEE/CIS states that had developed experience in juvenile justice to work with a common set of objectives and priorities, strengthen their approaches, and to document and share experience and lessons learnt for the benefit of other countries in the region. The second was a programme co-funded by the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights’ (EIDHR) on Consolidation of Juvenile Justice System Reforms against Torture and Other Forms of Ill-treatment of Children in Former Soviet Countries,” covering 8 countries3.

2.2 Objective, scope and methodology

In 2012, UNICEF decided to commission an independent evaluation of its work on juvenile justice in the region as part of a series of thematic multi-country evaluations aimed at assessing and reinforcing the impact of UNICEF’s work on the most vulnerable children. The present evaluation was carried out in partnership with the European Commission (EC) and constitute the final evaluation of the above-mentioned regional programme co-funded by EIDHR and UNICEF.

This joint EC and UNICEF multi-country evaluation (MCE) assesses the extent to which juvenile justice system reforms in eleven countries and territories of the CEE/CIS region during the period 2006-2012 have contributed to (a) reducing deprivation of liberty for children in conflict with the law, (b) increasing the use of diversion from the judicial process and (c) reducing the average duration of pre-sentence detention. These three results are necessary in ensuring the child’s reintegration into the community – i.e. the ultimate objective of juvenile justice reforms as stated above. They also correspond to interventions where UNICEF has been particularly active in the region. The evaluation reviews UNICEF’s and the EIDHR support to system level changes and assesses the extent to which this support contributed to the three above-mentioned results. The MCE was conducted in 11 selected countries and territories which had reported significant results in terms of reductions of children in detention (Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kosovo (UNSCR 1244), Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Montenegro, Tajikistan and Ukraine), with two overarching goals:

Demonstrate how reduction of equity gaps and impact results were made possible through changes in the national/regional/local systems and document UNICEF’s contribution to such changes;

1 Article 40(3) UN Convention on the Rights of the Chlid 2 See General Comment No 10 Part III. 3 Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Montenegro, Tajikistan, Ukraine.



Identify key lessons in order to improve current and future action.

The evaluation was carried out by a team of twelve independent consultants and took place between September 2013 and January 2015. The methodology was based on a reconstructed Theory of Change (TOC); this generated a series of hypotheses regarding the sequencing and causal links of changes in juvenile justice and UNICEF’s engagement. Using 16 evaluation questions, findings from the region were used to assess the validity of the logic underpinning the TOC; the extent to which the sequencing of inputs, outputs, outcomes and Impacts corresponded to the TOC, and whether the assumptions that link one level of the TOC to the next hold true. This was followed by a combined desk and field phase, based on documentary review, interviews and focus groups, and questionnaires for UNICEF staff and for practitioners and NGOs. Fieldwork was carried out in six of the 11 countries and territories included within the scope of the evaluation, with local experts assisting in the data collection in the remaining countries and territories. The evaluation team’s analysis was shared with UNICEF stakeholders and an expert panel at various stages and the final draft report was discussed during a validation workshop and passed an external quality assurance review.

2.3 Equity focus

An assumption behind UNICEF’s juvenile justice interventions in the region was that, because of the over-representation of vulnerable groups of children in detention, reducing the number of children in detention would automatically reduce the equity gap. The evaluators consider it highly probable that certain disadvantaged and marginalised groups are over-represented among children in conflict with the law, and are disproportionally likely to be charged, detained, convicted, and sentenced to closed facilities. It logically follows that the significant reduction in detention rates and length of detention achieved in these countries and territories during the period examined contributed indirectly to narrowing this equity gap in juvenile justice. A. The evaluators did not identify findings, or significant stakeholder opinion suggesting that a greater UNICEF focus on prevention, promoting non-custodial sentences or reintegration of sentenced juvenile offenders would have had a greater impact on reduction of equity gaps.

Gender disaggregated data is not available for all countries and territories, and in no country or territory is it available for all years covered by this evaluation. In the four countries and territories where gender disaggregated data is available, the proportion of girls among pre-sentence detainees has remained low: fewer than 5% in Albania and Georgia, and fewer than 10% (with a possible downward trend) in Armenia and Kazakhstan. Although there is a general trend towards establishment of specialised detention centres for boys, the few detained girls are usually held in adult facilities. These usually lack the specific services desirable for juvenile detainees. There was little willingness by Governments to address the problem of placing girls with adult females or of developing a greater range of community based services which could directly meet the needs of girls in conflict with the law.

Issues of ethno-linguistic, racial and religious discrimination are virtually absent from the discourse of practitioners in the field of juvenile justice. UNICEF staff and other stakeholders operate within a theoretical framework that is based on socio-economic disadvantage as the main or only vector of vulnerability, marginalisation and discrimination affecting children in conflict with the law. There is scant data available to confirm or refute these views. Rural children in conflict with the law are less likely than their urban counterparts to have access to specialised juvenile justice services.

2.4 Key evaluation findings

Changes in the Lives of Children

Result 1: There has been a significant 60% decrease in the number of children in detention pre and post-trial during the period under evaluation. For the region as a whole, the decline was constant throughout the period 2006-2012. There was a slight acceleration in the rate of this decline after 2008, possibly as a result of amnesties and/or the move away from ‘zero tolerance’ policies in several countries. The total number of



children in both pre- and post-sentence detention in these 11 countries and territories fell by almost 60% between 2006 and 2012. The number of children serving custodial sentences declined faster than the number in pre-trial detention. Only Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) and Albania show increases in some categories of detention. In Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) the total number of children in pre-sentence detention has risen, but the total number of children serving custodial sentences, and the overall number of children in detention has fallen. In Albania, the total number of children in pre-trial detention and the total number serving custodial sentences has increased.

Result 2: The proportion of children in conflict with the law who are diverted from judicial proceedings almost doubled during the period of this evaluation. Although the increase in the use of diversion is significant, the trend fluctuates; improvements in 2006-2008 were cancelled out in 2009 and 2010, but were then followed by a strong and sustained improvement.

Result 3: There have been uneven reductions in the average length of pre-sentence detention. In four out of 10 countries for which data is available, there was a decline in the length of pre-sentence detention of children during the period 2006-2012 (Moldova, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan and Montenegro). In the remaining countries and territories the length of pre-trial detention remained the same or increased. Despite the fall in some countries and territories, the length of pre-sentence detention is still long. The Committee on the Rights of the Child considers that detention before and during trial should not exceed 6 months.4 In 2012, the lowest average length of detention was in Ukraine (one month) and Montenegro (2-3 weeks) – while the longest average duration was reported in Albania (202 days or almost 7 months).

System level changes

Enabling environment

There is evidence of changes to professional social norms, which are defined (for the purpose of the MCE) as changes in social rules/behaviours, from a situation where decisions are made on the basis of punitive ideologies to a system based on a reasoned child-rights based policy. In all countries and territories, there is a measurable increase in understanding and recognition of reintegration as the appropriate approach to deal with young offenders among all categories of juvenile justice professionals. In some countries and territories, stakeholders perceive a change in social norms in society at large. In almost all countries and territories,

4 Specifically, the Committee on the Rights of the Child provides that legal proceedings should not last more than six months, which of necessity limits detention before and during proceedings.)



stakeholders perceive some positive change in portraying of children in conflict with the law within the media.

There has been significant progress in the legislative and regulatory framework for juvenile justice. However, in several countries UNICEF-sponsored legislative proposals have not met with the expected response from national authorities, suggesting that the ‘demand’ for such support may have been overestimated. More than 90% of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believed that legislation and policy in their country has improved in the last six years. Implementation is slowly but gradually catching up with legislative and regulatory reforms.

There is no, or only a slight, improvement in the budget and expenditure framework for juvenile justice. In general, there are no dedicated juvenile justice budget lines within concerned ministries, and no explicit link to action plans or policy implementation requirements. Nevertheless, in some countries and territories there is evidence of government’s gradual increase in funding, including in taking over responsibility for pilot projects and in some cases their expansion or generalisation. In a few countries and territories, modalities and channels of finance for delegating government services to NGOs have been developed. These findings should be understood in a context of stagnation or decline of overall government spending in several countries and territories, with low budget allocations for education and even more so for other child-related state competencies

There is evidence of positive changes in management and coordination mechanisms for juvenile justice reform during the period examined. These include improved coordination within government entities on juvenile justice, as well as the consolidation and expansion of national and sub-national multi-stakeholder coordination mechanisms. In some countries and territories, relevant data is not collected, or is not shared with stakeholders. The most significant data gaps concern allocation of state resources to juvenile justice, the length of pre-trial detention, and disaggregation of data. In some countries and territories, data collected is not collated at central government level and different agencies produce contradictory statistics. In most countries and territories, gender and ethnic disaggregated data is not available. In some countries and territories, there are inconsistencies in the data produced. There is encouraging progress towards collection and analysis of disaggregated data on juvenile justice though progress is uneven. Improvements were noted in Albania and Azerbaijan in particular.

Supply

In all countries and territories covered by this evaluation, there is evidence of improvement in availability and accessibility of services to support the reintegration of children in conflict with the law. Professionals dealing with these children receive adequate specialised training, particularly to deal with vulnerable children. In many countries and territories this training has been embedded in the state training institutes for juvenile justice practitioners, especially through the interventions co-funded by the EIDHR. There has been an expansion of relevant alternatives to detention for use by children in conflict with the law, though the range of alternatives is still limited in most countries and territories, particularly outside the major cities. Social services, health, education and civil society partners are increasingly involved at key stages of the juvenile justice process in all countries and territories. This generally positive finding is tempered by evidence of fluctuations in service provision, changes in policy, disruptive administrative reforms, and weaknesses in funding, reflecting political developments in several countries and territories. In this sense, improvements in access to adequately staffed services, facilities and information in the period 2006-2012 should not be considered as definitive, but rather as fragile and potentially reversible.

Quality

There is some evidence of changes in the quality of services in some of the countries and territories covered by this evaluation. Across the region, more than 70% of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believe that adherence to the required quality of juvenile justice services has improved over the last six years.



Demand

In all countries and territories covered by this evaluation, there is evidence of improvement in financial access to legal/paralegal assistance. Free legal assistance lawyers are generally in place, though not always in rural areas. In most countries and territories there are concerns with their training and knowledge of child rights, and with their levels of remuneration. Stakeholders in several countries and territories expressed concern that the most vulnerable children may not be able to access adequate legal/paralegal assistance. More than 80% of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believe that children and their families have become more aware of the risks and dangers of certain activities such as child labour, not going to school, or using illegal substances, that children are more aware of their rights, and that children and families are more likely to make positive choices to refrain from activities which could lead them into conflict with the law.

The UNICEF contribution, including with EIDHR

UNICEF has made a major contribution to juvenile justice reform in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, in particular using its core roles as follows:

Being the voice for children: This included advocating and communicating on key national policies, social issues, mind-sets and attitudes. In many of the countries and territories surveyed, clear, evidence-based advocacy messages have been developed and articulated by UNICEF. Partnerships were developed and opportunities used with other stakeholders for joint advocacy/communication. UNICEF was reported as extremely effective in its advocacy role towards Government and in bringing the issue of juvenile justice to international attention.

Policy advice and technical assistance. A consistently high proportion of stakeholders believed UNICEF had high impact with its policy advice and technical assistance work and especially in relation to legal reform which sets the framework for a lasting change in approach to juvenile justice. Modelling innovations. New models and pilots for alternative juvenile justice have been developed by UNICEF, including within the UNICEF/EIDHR regional programme. In all countries and territories, pilot projects have had a positive and catalytic role, including among categories of practitioners and decision-makers not initially strongly supportive of juvenile justice reform. In several countries and territories, pilot projects have been integrated into the state budget and multiplied. As one of several examples, the successful pilot project on Victim-Offenders Mediation in Montenegro in 2005, led to scaling up this model in 2007-2008 then to its expansion in the whole country.

Leveraging resources from the public and private sectors. The EU and UNICEF have developed a strategic relationship in this region. EU funding for UNICEF’s juvenile justice work, and for complementary actions by NGOs and other implementing parties, is a reflection of this relationship. UNICEF has also tried to leverage pre-accession and development cooperation frameworks between the EU and the countries and territories of Eastern Europe and Central Asia, to ensure that child rights are adequately taken into account.

Child rights monitoring and evaluation. Under the UNICEF/EIHDR programme, the capacity of human rights NGO and ombudsman’s offices in monitoring torture and ill-treatment of children was strengthened. Eight national monitoring reports were prepared and launched, in some cases with significant media and stakeholder interest. The reports triggered a series of in-depth reforms in several countries. Stakeholders in countries taking part in the UNICEF/EIDHR programme identified the research and monitoring on torture and ill-treatment of children in the juvenile justice system as particularly effective. UNICEF also carried out assessments of the juvenile justice system in almost all countries of the region.

Facilitating a national dialogue towards child-friendly norms. Activities to influence social norms included working with national and local stakeholder groups, coordinating bodies, NGOs or children, through advocacy, professional training, by using the media and through the use of materials, videos and presentations, in many of which children have participated. UNICEF’s impact on facilitating dialogue on child friendly social norms was borne out by the stakeholder survey in the 11 countries and territories. In all, stakeholders reported a measurable increase in understanding and recognition of reintegration as the



appropriate approach to be taken in dealing with young offenders amongst all categories of juvenile justice professionals.

Enabling knowledge exchange. UNICEF’s role in facilitating knowledge exchange between different categories of stakeholder (civil servant, civil society, development partner) as well as the promotion of regional knowledge exchange was highly appreciated by stakeholders. A regional conference on Justice for Children was held in Brussels with over 130 representatives from the EU and from 21 countries and territories of the region. In addition, a ‘Training of Master Trainers’ (TOMT) peer-support capacity building process was organised for seven countries5.

Stakeholder perceptions of UNICEF impact of core roles

Source: Field work interviews with 92 respondents in five countries. Interviews in Azerbaijan were not coded in the same way as for these countries. Interviewed stakeholders in Azerbaijan considered that UNICEF had achieved the greatest impact with its work on facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly social norms, and in monitoring and evaluation.

Relevance

Findings for this evaluation, including an internet-based survey of practitioners, suggest that UNICEF engagement, and the overall direction of juvenile justice reform in the region corresponds to the priorities shared by a large majority of committed stakeholders. In the great majority of countries and territories, stakeholders perceive a high or very high degree of alignment of UNICEF’s support with that of national governments and development partners. In several of the countries and territories examined, the UNICEF strategic focus was largely determined in response to emerging opportunities, rather than as the result of an explicit planning process.

Sustainability

Although there has been a promising start in many of the 11 countries and territories included in the evaluation, reforms remains fragile. The level of engagement with, and ownership of the reforms over the course of the interventions inevitably varied across the countries and territories.

5 Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Voice Leveragingresources

Facilitatingnationaldialogue

M&E Knowledgeexchange

Policy and TA Modelling/Pilots

Georgia Tadjikistan Moldova Albania Ukraine



In most countries and territories, there was a gradual increase in ownership, in the sense of government interest in, identification with and active engagement in the juvenile justice reform process, and responsibility for the outcomes achieved. Less encouraging is the level of governmental budget commitments. These seem to be falling in Tajikistan, and stagnating in Albania, Armenia and several other countries and territories. Even where government funding is increasing, such as Georgia and Montenegro, it is rarely earmarked for juvenile justice; in no country examined could it be said that government financial commitments reflect policy and action plan implementation requirements for juvenile justice. Some countries and territories continue to rely on donor and NGO funding for social service and diversion schemes, and to provide much of the expertise for juvenile justice reform. In several countries and territories, there have been recent indications of cuts in provision, reflecting the local impact of the regional financial and social crisis. The withdrawal of technical assistance and donor funding in a situation of economic downturn places reforms at risk. There is some evidence of increased human and institutional capacity in place for the sustained implementation of juvenile justice reform process. UNICEF, with EU support in some instances, has had considerable success in supporting national training institutions for juvenile justice practitioners in integrating juvenile justice reform into their curriculum. However, in some countries and territories funding cuts or fluctuation may lead to the dissipation of the human and institutional capacity. In all countries and territories, practitioners (both civil servants and NGO staff) considered that there has been an improvement in collaboration between the institutions of juvenile justice and NGOs in recent years.

2.5 Conclusions

The countries and territories examined in this evaluation started from a relatively unspecialized juvenile justice system, and all have made some progress. In accordance with its mandate and role, UNICEF has been the major and most consistent stakeholder advocating juvenile justice reform, as well as the principal source of know-how and technical assistance.

To some extent, the positive trends identified by this evaluation reflect a longer term and broader humanisation of the justice system. Nevertheless, in several countries and territories, improvements in the juvenile justice indicators can be linked to specific reforms, and in many cases these can be linked to actions supported by UNICEF and the EU. A reduction in the rate and length of juvenile detention was closely related to changes in social norms and access to services such as the existence of trained juvenile justice practitioners, particularly judges, prosecutors and police, in a context of practitioner awareness of, and support for, juvenile justice reform. Increased rates of diversion were closely related to access to available and adequately staffed services. The development of diversion appeared to be particularly dependent upon the establishment of initial pilot diversion programmes and the existence of informed and trained juvenile justice practitioners, particularly social workers, police and prosecutors. Decreases in the length of pre-sentence detention was closely related to legislation/policy, to reforms in criminal procedure and case management and to the availability of community based services. The evaluation showed that UNICEF has had a particularly high impact on reform through its policy and technical assistance work, facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly norms and in modelling and piloting. The evaluation demonstrated that political support can be generated during the reform process using a combination of advocacy and policy advice, technical assistance for capacity development and promotion of conducive social norms. Therefore, while desirable, Government political support and active engagement for juvenile justice reform should in most cases not be seen as preconditions for UNICEF’s engagement in juvenile justice.

It can be concluded that UNICEF’s support to juvenile justice reforms was appropriate, has resulted in many positive changes, and has contributed towards progress in meeting international standards. In particular, the UNICEF/EIHDR juvenile justice regional programme had considerable impact and resulted in some very positive steps towards the implementation of a juvenile justice system.

The lack of data and information management however meant it was not always possible to measure UNICEF’s impact on the reform. As mentioned, the failure to include racial and ethnic groups facing



discrimination and the lack of initial baseline data on marginalised groups made it impossible to determine the extent to which the equity gap was reduced or closed in the countries and territories covered by this evaluation.

2.6 Recommendations

Cluster 1: Intensify efforts to reduce deprivation of liberty for children in Eastern Europe and Central Asia

These recommendations are addressed to all stakeholders

1.1. Further efforts to reduce the average length of pre-trial detention could be based on the experience of Moldova, which experienced a significant decline in the average length of pre-trial detention during the period in question, and Montenegro and Kyrgyzstan, which achieved significant declines towards the end of the period in question.

1.2 UNICEF should consider placing greater emphasis on prevention services as well as further support of diversion options and alternative (non-custodial) sentences in further juvenile justice interventions.

1.3 Stakeholders should consider giving further attention to the challenges linked to the provision of adequate treatment for girls, including adequate conditions for girl detainees

1.4 UNICEF and other development partners should reinforce national capacity in the area of administrative data collection, disaggregation and sharing, as well as directly commissioning relevant studies to fill the major knowledge gaps that are obstacles to the design, monitoring and evaluation of reforms and related UNICEF interventions.

Cluster 2: UNICEF’s prospective approach to Juvenile justice reform in CEE/CIS could be based on a revised and adapted Theory of Change

These recommendations are addressed to the UNICEF Regional Office and Country Offices

2.1 UNICEF should focus their engagement on the core roles (Enabling knowledge exchange, Policy advice and technical assistance, Modelling/piloting) and key determinants (legislation and policy; adequately staffed services, facilities and information; social norms) that have the greatest catalyst and multiplier value and the greatest direct impact on the results.

2.2 Within UNICEF, strengthen monitoring and reporting related to juvenile justice and access to justice, focusing on changes for children/impact and systems level changes and equity gaps rather than on monitoring of programme delivery.

2.3 UNICEF should ensure that the Theory of Change and UNICEF core roles are adequately understood by staff and external stakeholders.

2.4 In several of the countries and territories covered by this evaluation, detention is used as a last resort. In those countries and territories, UNICEF might consider shifting its focus to other aspects of justice for children, but it should bear in mind that reforms are still at an early stage, are likely to be fragile, especially where there is a change of government.

Cluster 3: The EU and UNICEF could consider reinforcing their cooperation on juvenile justice and children’s access to justice

These recommendations are addressed to UNICEF HQ and to the EU (DEVCO and EEAS)

3.1 The EU and UNICEF should consider building upon the UNICEF/EIDHR regional programme and combining resources to keep the moment of reform in the field of children’s access to justice.

3.2 Stakeholders could consider developing benchmarks and indicators of progress in juvenile justice reform in the region, including by drawing on the UNICEF/UNODC indicators.



3.3 The EU and UNICEF could consider giving increased support to actions that empower children as actors for juvenile justice reform, and in defence of their own rights regarding the justice system.

3.4 The EU and UNICEF could consider expanding their cooperation on juvenile justice reform and children’s access to justice in the region.

3.5 The EU and UNICEF could consider expanding their cooperation on juvenile justice reform and children’s access to justice outside the region.



The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) requires States to promote the establishment of laws,

procedures, authorities and institutions specifically applicable to children who are alleged as, accused of or

recognised as having infringed the criminal law.6 Put more simply, the UN Committee on the Rights of the

Child requires that States establish a juvenile justice system, whose principal aim is to rehabilitate and

reintegrate children into their communities and society.7

The CRC and the UN Minimum Standards and Norms of Juvenile Justice8, set out the rights of children in

conflict with the law. These instruments highlight the right of the child to be treated with dignity, the right

not to be the subject of discrimination, the right of the child to have his or her best interests treated as a

primary consideration, the right to be heard and the right to legal assistance. Recognising that detention is

harmful to the development of a child, the CRC requires that detention should only be used as a matter of

last resort and for the shortest appropriate period of time.9

UNICEF works on the premise that children who come into conflict with the law are amongst the most

vulnerable in society. By focusing on realising the rights of these children, UNICEF hopes to contribute to

narrowing equity gaps among children in society.

There are a number of risk factors that contribute to children coming into conflict with the law. These include

poverty, lack of parental care, neglect, unmet mental health needs and learning disabilities. Children from

groups in society that face discrimination, whether on the basis of race, ethnic origin, religion, social class or

for some other country-specific reason, are particularly at risk of being arrested and detained. They are also

more likely to be convicted, and more likely to receive a custodial sentence on conviction.

Although states in the CEE/CIS region share a common political and legal heritage, all experienced a period

of far reaching political and economic transformation during the 1990s. Some of the 11 countries and

territories covered by this evaluation aspire to EU membership; while others are focused on Eurasian or

Central Asian integration. The stability and accountability of political leadership and state institutions varies

between the countries and, in some, there have been dramatic changes in governance during the period

covered by this evaluation. Economic conditions in some of the countries have improved during the period

in question, while others have suffered from economic decline. In many countries of the region, civil society

is still weak, with a relatively low density of organisations, which tend to be dependent on foreign donors

rather than local constituencies.

6 Article 40(3) UN Convention on the Rights of the Chlid 7 See General Comment No 10 Part III.

8 These include the United Nations Guidelines for the Prevention of Juvenile Delinquency: Resolution adopted by the General

Assembly, 14 December 1990, UN GAOR A/RES/45/112 [Hereinafter the Riyadh Guidelines.]; United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Administration of Juvenile Justice: Resolution adopted by the General Assembly, 29 November 1985, UN GAOR A/RES/40/33 [Hereinafter the Beijing Rules.]; United Nations Rules for the Protection of Juveniles Deprived of their Liberty: Resolution adopted by the General Assembly, UN GAOR A/RES/45/113, Annex 45, UN GAOR Supp. (No. 49A) at 205, U.N. Doc. A/45/49 (1990) [Hereinafter the Havana Rules.]. The Havana Rules provide detailed minimum standards for the care and treatment of juveniles deprived of their liberty. See also Guidelines for Action on Children in the Criminal Justice System, United Nations Economic and Social Council, 21 July 1997, Resolution 1997/30. Hereinafter the Vienna Guidelines. 9 Article 37(b) UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

3. BACKGROUND SCOPE AND OBJECTIVES OF THE JUVENILE JUSTICE PROGRAMMES AND THE EVALUATION

3.1. Background and regional context



While there have been moves towards humanization of the penal system in some countries and territories

of the CIS/CEE region, juvenile justice has been characterized by a focus on punishment rather than

rehabilitation, prosecution rather than diversion, and on detention rather than community alternatives.

Indeed, no country in the CEE/CIS region has a fully specialised and separate justice system for children.

“The vast majority of children in conflict with the law in the region are accused of petty or non-violent

offences. A significant number are deprived of their liberty for what are called ‘status offences’ (acts

classified as offenses only when committed as children) such as truancy, alcohol use or ‘being beyond

parental control’. Many others are engaged in survival behaviours such as petty thieving, vagrancy or

prostitution.”10

UNICEF’s approach to juvenile justice in the CEE/CIS region over the period 2006-2012 included a series of

interventions at country level, as well as two initiatives/projects led by the Regional Office. The interventions

supported by UNICEF in the 11 countries evaluated for this programme fell within what UNICEF refers to as

its core roles11:

Policy advice and technical assistance

Being a voice for children and adolescents;

Modelling/piloting;

Monitoring and evaluation;

Enabling knowledge exchange;

Capacity development;

Ensuring proper controls and risk management; and to a lesser extent;

Facilitating national dialogue towards child-friendly norms; and

Leveraging resources from the public and private sectors.

In addition to the specific country-based interventions, there were two initiatives led by the Regional Office,

which contributed to a regional approach:

The first, entitled the ‘critical mass’ exercise, started in 2008. It aimed at encouraging a group of

countries that had developed experience and/or momentum in a particular field to work with a common

set of objectives and priorities, strengthen their approaches, and to document and share experience and

lessons learnt for the benefit of other countries in the region.12

The second regional project, “Consolidation of Juvenile Justice System Reforms against Torture and Other

Forms of Ill-treatment of Children in Former Soviet Countries and territories,” was co-funded by the EU

through the EIDHR Thematic Programme, and implemented under the coordination of the UNICEF

Regional Office between 2011 and mid-2014. This programme covered 8 countries and had as its aim,

‘contributing to development of specialized juvenile justice systems in line with international and

European standards. Under this programme, a systemic approach to juvenile justice reform was

followed to bring about ‘changes at system level’. The project received an EU contribution of €1,200,000

and a €300,000 contribution from UNICEF. It was completed in June 2014, including a six-month no-cost

extension to allow for this evaluation to take place.

The overall objective of the EIHDR/UNICEF project are set out in Table 1.

10 Final report, EIDHR Project project “Consolidation of Juvenile Justice System Reforms against Torture and Other Forms of Ill-treatment of Children in Former Soviet Countries” 11 Note that at a later stage, the regional core roles were reduced to 7 (excluding capacity development – which was understood to be inherent in the other roles). 12 For more detail on the critical mass exercise, see the UNICEF Guidance Note for CEE/CIS on juvenile justice programming in the CEE/CIS Region 2010.



Table 1: The objectives and expected results of the EIHDR/UNICEF Project

Overall objective Enhancing respect for human rights, the rule of law and good governance in the

administration of justice for children in former Soviet countries

Specific objective Contributing to the development of specialized juvenile justice systems in line with

international and European standards in eight targeted countries

Expected Result 1 Improved knowledge and specialization in established juvenile justice systems

Expected Result 2 Improved capacity of law enforcement and justice professionals to handle child

cases

Expected Result 3 Better targeted monitoring and rehabilitation needs assessments

In essence, the interventions contained within the UNICEF and the EIHDR programmes covered all aspects of

the juvenile justice system from the moment of apprehension to post-sentencing integration, including policy

reform, law reform and practice reform. A detailed description of the interventions and the origin of the

funding allocated to them in the 11 countries is set out in Volume 2, Annex 8 to this report.

The ToR for this evaluation requested an independent assessment of changes and the main drivers of change

in the field of juvenile justice in 11 countries and territories (Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia,

Kazakhstan, Kosovo (UNSCR 1244), Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Montenegro, Tajikistan and Ukraine). The TOR

requested a forward-looking evaluation, with two overarching objectives:

to demonstrate how reduction of equity gaps and impact results were made possible through changes

in the national / regional / local systems and to document UNICEF’s contribution to such changes;

to identify key lessons in order to improve current and future action

The ToR translated these two overarching objectives into the following five objectives.

To assess the extent to which juvenile justice system reforms (and UNICEF’s and the EIDHR’s13

contribution to them) have succeeded in (i) reducing deprivation of liberty for children in conflict

with the law, (ii) increasing the use of diversion from the judicial process and (iii) reducing the average

duration of pre-sentence detention. The ToR for this evaluation explained that these three results

are “necessary in ensuring the child’s reintegration into the community – i.e. the ultimate objective

of juvenile justice reforms as stated above.” UNICEF also intended the evaluation to assess to what

extent these three results were sufficient to ensure the child’s reintegration to the community. It is

important to remember that the three results are retroactively applied as an analytical tool. In

several of the countries and territories examined, the UNICEF programme did not explicitly aim at

achieving the three indicators that are the subject of this evaluation.14

13 The EIDHR’s contribution to be evaluated is limited to the regional EIDHR Project implemented by UNICEF in eight CIS countries and territories. 14 Indeed, in one of the UNICEF offices, staff were surprised and intrigued by the evaluators’ attempt to establish what the ultimate goal of UNICEF’s various country-level activities were.

3.2. The objective of the evaluation



To identify which policies and measures have been the most efficient in meeting the above objectives

for different groups of children, including children from ethnic minorities, and families with lower

income or in otherwise difficult circumstances.

To assess UNICEF’s general contribution, and the EIDHR regional project’s specific contribution, to

the reforms and in particular to the three results mentioned in the first bullet point above.

To reveal and share good practices and extract general lessons learned in current approaches.

To suggest potential redirections and provide recommendations for action.

The EIHDR/UNICEF regional project ‘Consolidation of Juvenile Justice System Reforms against Torture and Other Forms of Ill-Treatment of Children in Former Soviet Countries’ funded through the EIDHR has been a significant component of the EU support provided to UNICEF juvenile justice programming in the region during the period. The EU and UNICEF agreed to make it part of the present multi-country evaluation. The purpose of combining the evaluations was to ensure that the best evidence was available when devising joint EU/UNICEF follow up strategies on juvenile justice.15 By combining the two evaluations is hoped that the result will be:

A complete picture of support to reforms;

Greater visibility and a joint EU-UNICEF basis for further action

Joint EU-UNICEF understanding of the equity dimension of juvenile justice system reforms.

In line with the multi-faceted nature of the evaluation objectives, the TOR envisage multiple uses for the

evaluation results. These are:

To enhance UNICEF’s, the EU’s, governments' and other partners’ understanding of what works and

what does not work in supporting reforms of juvenile justice systems in line with international and

European standards.

To inform both UNICEF’s and the EU’s further involvement in juvenile justice systems reform in the

region. The findings of the evaluation may be used to design UNICEF’s and the EU’s future plans in

this respect.

To prepare the ground for a potential joint EU/UNICEF approach to juvenile justice system reform in

the CEE/CIS region, including in terms of integration of such reform into broader justice sector

reforms.

To share lessons learned, as well as potential innovations, within UNICEF, the EU and beyond – e.g.

through the Inter-Agency Panel on Juvenile Justice (14 UN entities and international NGOs working

on juvenile justice worldwide).

To make UNICEF’s and the EU’s contributions visible to others (e.g. EU Member States or, in the case

of UNICEF, donors such as the governments of Switzerland, Sweden and the Netherlands).

15 The evaluation is one of five commissioned as part of a broader organizational re-focus on equity and the scaling-up of reforms undertaken by UNICEF’s Regional Office for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia (RO) with a view to targeting inequities affecting the most disadvantaged children in the CEE/CIS.



The selection of the 11 countries (Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kosovo (UNSCR 1244),

Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Montenegro, Tajikistan and Ukraine) was based on two different considerations:

a first set of seven countries: Albania, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kosovo (UNSCR 1244), Kyrgyzstan, Moldova,

and Montenegro, were selected following discussions within UNICEF both at Regional Office level and

country level based on the degree to which they fulfilled the following set of criteria: i) have invested in

juvenile justice reforms over a number of years; ii) have available reliable data at impact level; iii) have

the potential capacity to generate useful lessons for others, due either to having followed a systemic,

comprehensive approach to reforms or to having put innovative models in place.

a second set of eight countries (which overlap with the first): Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova,

Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Ukraine were then selected as they were covered by the regional

EIDHR project.

The evaluation is both based on, and is designed to test, UNICEF’s Theory of Change (ToC), which was outlined

in the ToR. The ToC is based on the assumption that the progressive realization of child rights and the

reduction of equity gaps in juvenile justice are best achieved through system level changes.16

The hypotheses which underpin the ToC are, first, that through each of its country offices UNICEF plays seven

core roles, namely:

1. The ‘Voice’ for children and adolescents: for example advocating and communicating on key

national policies, social issues, mind-sets and attitudes.

2. Leveraging resources from the public and private sectors: for example supporting and redirecting

reforms, including those supported by the EU, IFIs, bilateral and national/multi-national

corporations.

3. Facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly social norms: for example bringing together

government, private sector and Civil Society - and convening divergent forces - so as to enhance

public debate, participation and action on quality and child rights.

4. Monitoring and evaluation: for example supporting independent assessments of the functioning

of the systems guaranteeing child rights, as well as efforts for the progressive realisation of child

rights, and reduction of equity gaps in child well-being.

5. Enabling knowledge exchange: for example fostering horizontal co-operation and exchange of

experience between countries and regions on ‘what works’ in terms of enhancing child well-

being and equity.

6. Policy advice and technical assistance: for example through well-designed UNICEF positions

(based on local, regional, international best practice) on key issues, supporting development of

the normative frameworks relating to specific national legislation, policies or programmes, as

well as private sector standards that improve equity.

7. Modelling/piloting: for example demonstrating how systems could meaningfully evolve to

reduce equity gaps and children’s rights violations.

16 « Regional Knowledge and Leadership Agenda – Generic Theory of Change Underlying UNICEF’s Approach in CEE/CIS Region », January 2013.

3.3. Country selection

3.4. Theoretical framework

3.4.1. Theory of change



Second, that these core roles lead to system changes which can be analysed along a set of ten key

determinants, which in turn are grouped along the four main categories:

A. An enabling environment with 1. Conducive social norms: social assumptions and media vilification of young offenders should

change so as to create a system based on reasoned policy rather than punitive emotional responses. This is done by enabling justice policy-makers, professionals (such as lawyers, human rights activists, ombudsperson), academics, and the media, to take a public position on the issue to influence social norms and support legislation and practice conducive to promoting rehabilitation rather than punishment models.

2. Adequate legislation and policy in place: for example there should be in place for police or prosecutors the legal power to divert, with no mandatory prosecution for certain crimes. There should be provision for community supervision and policies, and guidance for professionals enacting them. The use of detention as a last resort should be clearly set out in legislation and reflected throughout the full legal framework in a broad sense as well as in practical professional guidelines.

3. Adapted budgets: budgets and expenditures can show the extent to which children are considered a priority and, within this, where children in conflict with the law stand. In practice a budget that encompasses a good juvenile justice policy will demonstrate that funds are targeted not on detention but on prevention, diversion support and implementation and promotion of alternatives to detention. These policies are generally the most cost-effective as well as more child-friendly. The evidence for this will be the existence of a mechanism for delegating government services, such as reintegration, to NGOs, and effective payment or co-payment by the ministries concerned. In turn, the existence of dedicated juvenile justice budget lines within the ministries concerned, such as education, health and social welfare will demonstrate cross-governmental budgetary support.

4. Operational coordination mechanisms: a mechanism should exist that manages and coordinates juvenile justice policies and service delivery, with clearly defined accountabilities and involving all relevant stakeholders such as the Ministries of Interior, Justice and Social Affairs, the Prosecutor’s Office and NGOs.

B. Appropriate supply: 5. Availability of essential commodities: this determinant has been deemed inapplicable in the TOR.

6. Access to adequate staff services, facilities and information: the system should demonstrate

support and services for children in conflict with the law at all stages of the juvenile justice process, particularly ensuring the involvement of social services, health, education and Civil Society players. There should be a wide range of relevant alternatives to detention for use by children in conflict with the law. In addition, professionals dealing with children in conflict with the law should have adequate and specialist training to address children’s rights and needs, including the police, prosecutors, judges, social workers, probation officers, lawyers, psychologists and other service providers. Children should be seen by professionals able to assess their needs adequately with the aid of services appropriately tailored to meeting them.

C. Ability to express demand 7. Financial capacity to access the services: a free legal or paralegal assistance for juveniles should

be in place. This should be accessible to all children across the country, particularly certain groups such as ethnic minorities, lower income families, migrants and children with disabilities. Children should be able to access legal assistance and legal aid. Lawyers should be highly educated,



knowledgeable of children’s rights, and sufficiently remunerated and willing to take up children’s cases. Other services, including victim/offender mediation, should be free of charge as well.

8. Enabling social and cultural practices: children and their families should be aware of the risks and

dangers of certain activities such as child labour, not going to school, or using illegal substances; and it needs to be ensured that children are aware of their rights, and that children and families can make positive choices to refrain from activities which could lead them into conflict with the law.

9. Continued ability to make timely use of the services: the justice system should have appropriate after-care services that support reintegration into society for children who have received a criminal sanction. The juvenile justice system should be aware of the proportion of children who are recidivists and have strategies in place to counter this. Other services to be made available include prevention programmes and alternatives to deprivation of liberty.

D. Quality 10. Adherence to required quality of services: it needs to be ensured that juvenile justice practices

comply with international standards and that supporting data is being collected routinely and reliably by an appropriate data collection body. In turn, there should exist an independent monitoring mechanism overseeing compliance with standards and promoting and protecting children’s rights.

Finally it is expected that, with respect to juvenile justice, changes in these 10 determinants at system level will in turn lead to the achievement of the three expected main results at impact level:17

a) reduced deprivation of liberty for children in conflict with the law; b) increased use of diversion from the judicial process; c) reduced average duration of pre-sentence detention.

During the inception phase, the evaluators proposed an effects diagram, which is reproduced below in table

3. The purpose of the effects diagram is to explain the theory of change in an easily accessible form. It is

composed of four columns.

a) the first is titled ‘inputs’ which are in the form of i) human capacities (both internal to UNICEF and

external); ii) financial resources; and iii) stewardship and governance. Inputs also included previous

work by UNICEF in building the juvenile justice system, the EIHDR and UNICEF programme, inputs of

other external assistance programmes and government and other specific inputs;

b) the second column is ‘outputs’ which result from the activities / functions carried out by UNICEF;

c) the third column concerns the expected outcomes, which are the achievement of the seven core

roles which underpin the UNICEF ToC; and

d) last, the expected impact of the activities / functions carried out by UNICEF. The expected impact

was the realisation of the three targets set for the project (reduction in use of detention; greater use

17 As stated by the ToR, these “three results are necessary in ensuring the child’s reintegration into the community – i.e. the ultimate objective of juvenile justice reforms”...“They also correspond to interventions where UNICEF has been particularly active in the region and are among the global juvenile justice indicators developed by UNICEF and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), which reinforces their legitimacy”.

3.5. The ‘effects diagram’



of pre-trial diversion from judicial proceedings and a reduction in the time spend in pre-trial custody)

which, in turn would have an impact on reducing the equity gap and contributing to the progressive

realisation of children’s rights.

In addition to the four columns, the diagram shows one box on the left of the columns and two boxes at the

bottom. The factors listed in the three boxes were all regarded as likely to have an effect on each of the four

columns.

The box on the left of the columns contains the terms ‘context features and other external factors.’

These allowed for country specific factors to be taken into account, and applied across all four columns;

the first box at the bottom is labelled ‘cross-cutting issues and working principles’. This takes into

account that UNICEF’s approach to juvenile justice in the region builds upon the integration of a human

rights based approach and gender mainstreaming in all activities; and that the involvement of key

stakeholders in the definition of priorities and operationalization of activities is at the core of UNICEF’s

approach;

the second box at the bottom of the chart refers to intervention context features and assumptions.

Unlike the box on the left that deals with country specific context factors, this box addresses factors in

a country which are likely to have a particular effect on juvenile justice reform, and therefore the inputs,

outputs, outcomes and impact of the UNICEF and EIHDR programme. These include a stable political

context; political commitment; readiness and support for juvenile justice reform; interest of the

international community and the media. The box also contains a list of assumptions, which were subject

to detailed analysis during the evaluation.

The evaluation’s stakeholders are both internal to UNICEF (Country Offices, Regional Office, Headquarters),

the EC (EIDHR Desk in Brussels and EC Delegations), and external bodies (governmental institutions, other

UN agencies, NGOs, multilateral and bilateral donors and the children who are the direct beneficiaries). The

evaluators’ analysis of stakeholders is reflected in the findings section of this report and in the relevant

country factsheets.18

18 See annex 7. Stakeholders consulted and annex 12, Country fact sheets.

3.6. Stakeholders


Draft Final Report January 2015 Page 26

Figure 1: Regional Theory of Change for UNICEF’s Juvenile Justice Reform Initiative in Eastern Europe and Central Asia

INTERVENTION CONTEXT FEATURES, EXTERNAL FACTORS and ASSUMPTIONS. The results chain is affected by a variety of actors and factors. Among these: i) stable political context, ii) political commitment, readiness and support for juvenile justice reform; iii) interest of the international community and the media.

Inputs

Knowledge generated and exchanged:- Innovations, lessons learned, good practices and gaps shared;

- Multi-country ministerial level conference organised, scientific and sub-regional reform achievements documentation drafted and

disseminated.

Use of diversion from the judicial process for

children in conflict with law increased

Deprivation of liberty for children in conflict with the law reduced

Human capacities (internal

and external)

Stewardship and

governance

OutcomesOutputs Impact

Average duration of pre-sentence

detention for children in conflict with law

reduced

Voice for children & adolescents-Clear, evidence-based advocacy messages awareness campaigns

developed & articulated; - Advocacy & Comm strategy in place: multiple channels used, targets at different levels (media, communities, duty bearers, right holders...)Representation of children’s experiences : Knowledge on video prod.

acquired by children, videos recorded & disseminated.

Financial capacity to access the services

Availability of free legal or paralegal assistance (across the country and for all children, incl. most vulnerable) increased

Monitoring and evaluation / Research & Assessment-Quality evaluations and research reports (incl. assessment of

marginalised groups, gaps on JJ reform, …) undertaken & research findings disseminated & discussed;

- Baselines for measurement of changes overtime established .-- Research on rehabilitation needs of child victims of torture or ill-

treatment, by monitoring bodies and human rights NGOs

National events / communication campaigns to promote dialogue on child friendly norms & standards for JJ organised / supported.

Building Blocks of JJ reforms and related programme

design (UNICEF

guidance note CEE/CIS)

SPECIALIZED JUVENIL JUSTICE SYSTEMS IN LINE WITH INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS IN PLACE

Leveraging resources from the public and private sectors:Clear evidenced-based advocacy positions on JJ financing &

Functioning working relationships with main funders of JJ established by UNICEF.

CON

TEXT

FEA

TURE

S AN

D O

THER

EXT

ERN

AL F

ACTO

RS

Adherence to required quality of services- JJ standards, registration regulations & certification processes as well as

supervision and inspection systems and guidelines in line with international law in place

- Independent monitoring oversight mechanisms / body in place & data routinely collected (incl. on registered cases of violations and follow-up)

Policy advice and technical assistance / Support to legal reform- Materials and modules for training of JJ professionals

developed/strengthened;- Guidelines, tools and procedures for duty bearers in JJ systems

developed/strengthened;- Gaps in JJ systems’ legal , regulatory and institutional framework

identified and recommendations provided.

Modelling/piloting:- Pilots and models responsive to needs of marginalised groups

developed, carried out and documented;- Results of models / pilots compared to traditional JJ models- Government committed to assess feasibility of upscaling of

successful pilots

Financial resources

Adequate legislation and policy in placeNational child-specific legislation, regulations and policies in place: National legal instruments for diversion in place; Legal and practical guarantees for detention as measure of last resort; National & sub-national legislation &

policies for community supervision; .....Adapted budgets

Budget lines, budget allocations and disbursements reflect JJ policy and action plan requirements: dedicated budget lines for JJ system within

concerned ministries, funding for JJ targeted towards prevention, diversion and alternatives to detention & towards support for marginalised groups

Enabling social and cultural practicesConsequences and risks of certain activities better understood by children

and their families & Fear of stigmatization for seeking support / attending services reduced during detention

Continued ability to make timely use of the servicesAccess to reintegration / after-care services increased

Critical Mass Exercise

Access to adequate staff services, facilities and informationCapacity of law enforcement & justice professionals (incl. free legal

assistance lawyers) to handle child cases improved

- Policy-makers and decision-takers are committed to reform and respond to research findings / advice (and pressure) from international partners; - Governments deploy necessary resources to implement reforms;- Commitment &responsiveness of duty bearers (judiciary , JJ prof, ...) to JJ reform;- Cooperation with NGOs and other local community-based organisations and services;- Citizens, duty bearers, right holders respond to awareness campaigns

Conducive social normsRehabilitation recognised & understood as appropriate approach when

dealing with young offenders

• Continued political commitment to reform processes• Institutional and human capacity of public sector / duty bearers to carry out revised roles; • Strength of domestic accountability • Nature of demand for Govt services & Responses to changing environment by right holders

PROGRESSIVE REALISATION OF CHILD RIGHTS AND EQUITY /

RESPECT FOR HR, THE RULE OF LAW AND GOOD

GOVERNANCE IN THE ADMINISTRATION of

JUSTICE FOR CHILDREN ENHANCED

Assumption: due to over-representation of vulnerable groups of children in detention, reducing the n. of children in detention would reduce the equity gaps

- Timely mobilisation and strategic allocation by UNICEF of sufficient funding and of adequately skilled human resources;- Commitment of Government and duty bearers (judiciary , JJ professionals, ...) to JJ reform;- Strong partnership established with Government counterparts

(A) Enabling Environment in place

(C) Access to and use of services increased (Demand enabled)

(D) Quality of interventions

Availability of essential commoditiesAvailability of wide range of relevant alternatives to detention as well as reintegration services (probation, supervision, counselling, ...) for use by

children in conflict with the law increased

Operational coordination mechanisms

Improved management and multi-stakeholder coordination mechanisms (incl. data collection) in place and operational

(B) Services and adequate support are available (Appropriate supply)

CROSS-CUTTING ISSUES & WORKING PRINCIPLES: Human rights based approach & gender mainstreaming integrated in all interventions. Participation: involvement of key stakeholders in the definition of priorities and operationalisation of activities.

EIDHR/UNICEF project CEE-CIS

Legenda:Normal text: UNICEFItalics: EIDHRUnderlined: both

Inputs of other external assistance

programmes

Main Gov.tprogrammes and

other specific inputs



This section briefly presents the overall evaluation process, the information on which the findings are based

(data collection), and the main challenges and limits faced by the evaluation. More details on the specific

methodological aspects and approaches used for the evaluation can be found in Annex 11.

The evaluation was originally conceived in four main phases: i) an inception phase; ii) a desk phase; iii) a field

phase; and iii) a synthesis phase. However, the contractor initially selected was not able to complete the

evaluation. The evaluation was finalised by a second contractor with Terms of Reference covering a different

range of tasks. The actual evaluation process was, therefore, somewhat different from the original

conception.

Figure 2 provides an overview of the four main phases, specifying for each of them the activities carried out,

the deliverables produced and the meetings with and feedback from the Reference Group (RG19), Advisory

Group20 with the UNICEF Country Offices (COs) and European Union Delegations (EUDs) in the 11 countries

and territories.21 Further details are provided in the paragraphs that follow.

Figure 2: Key evaluation steps

19 Comprised of the UNICEF Representatives and staff in the countries and territories where the evaluation took place. 20 A group of regional and international juvenile justice experts, invited to review and comment on draft deliverables. 21 In countries and territories where there were no field missions, telephone interviews with the UNICEF CO were organised.

Meetings

Deliverables Presentation

(PowerPoint) for the

dissemination

workshop

RG: Reference Group; CD: in-country de-briefing; TW: team workshop

Tasks

Final Report

• Reference group meeting

in Geneva

• Data collection &

analysis, elaboration of

research methodology and

tools

• Revision of UNCIEF Theory

of Change diagram

• Inventory of UNICEF

interventions and analysis

• Elaboration of Judgement

Criteria & Indicators

• Selection of countries for

field visits

• Identification of local

experts

• Pilot visit to Azerbajan

• Inception Report writing

(& quality control)

• Team workshop in

Rome on methodological

issues for country visits

• Document analysis

• Methodological design

(specific to field visits)

• Design, validate and

administer surveys for

UNICEF COs and for

practitioners

• Data collection by local

consultants in five

countries and territories

• Field visits in five

countries

• Team workshop on

Rome to elaborate

regional findings and

preliminary

conclusions and

recommendations

• Drafting answers

to EQs

• Drafting

conclusions and

recommendations

• Incorporation of

comments received

from UNICEF RO and

COs, revision of draft

report

• Incorporation of

comments and

revision of draft

report

• Meetings with

Reference Group and

Expert Panel in

Geneva

• Inclusion of

Reference Group

and Expert Panel

comments

• Finalisation of

report

• Initial meeting at

country level

• Data collection and

analysis

• Note writing on field

phase findings

• Discussion of

preliminary findings

with UNICEF CO

Inception Report Surveys Presentation for the

UNICEF CO

Draft Final Report 1,

Draft Final Report 2,

Draft Final Report 3

INCEPTION PHASE

Inception Stage

FIELD PHASE SYNTHESIS PHASE

Desk Stage Draft Final Report

ValidationWorkshop

Final Report

RG RGCD

DESK PHASE

TW TWCD

4. METHODOLOGY

4.1. The evaluation process



1. The Inception phase aimed at defining – together with the Reference Group - the framework of the

evaluation. The evaluators collected and analysed information related to the regional context and to the

UNICEF activities in the region, including information shared by UNICEF country offices and Regional Office.

An inception meeting with the evaluation team and UNICEF Regional Office took place in Geneva in

September 2013. In anticipation of the six field missions envisaged in the ToRs, a pilot mission was carried

out in Azerbaijan. The review of pertinent policy and programming documents, interviews carried out during

the pilot mission and the analysis of funding flows led to the drafting and subsequent acceptance of the

Inception Report in February 2014. This report included:

- a description of the regional context and evaluation framework;

- the reconstruction of a regional theory of change and analysis of key stakeholders involved;

- the methodology to be applied (tools for data analysis and data collection)

- the drafting of the Evaluation Matrix (EQs) along with the definition of Indicators for each EQ and

identification of sources and tools to be used, with the intent of focusing the scope of the evaluation

better. This matrix was endorsed by the evaluation reference group at the end of the inception phase.22

2. The Desk phase aimed at providing preliminary answers to the evaluation questions to be then further

substantiated, confirmed or amended during the field phase. The evaluators carried out further analysis of

documentary sources, and this information was gathered at country level into corresponding Factsheets.

Statistical analysis was performed on data provided by a range of national authorities and by UNICEF,

including a coding of UNICEF tasks according to the different levels of the theory of change.

The evaluators identified potential gaps in the availability of data and their ability to collect and analyse data

in the time available. To address these issues, two internet-based surveys were designed and implemented,

with a view to inform and substantiate the indicators identified in relation to each evaluation question on

the basis of the agreed methodological framework. A first survey solicited responses from staff in all 11

UNICEF Country Offices, to complement the face-to-face or telephone interviews. A second and more

extensive survey was directed at practitioners, and distributed in all 11 countries and territories in English,

Russian, Albanian and Montenegrin language versions.23

3. The field phase, which ran concurrently with the desk phase, consisted of five additional field missions, to

Albania, Georgia, Moldova, Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine. Activities carried out included: semi-structured

interviews, focus groups, additional documentary analysis, and visits to project sites, pre-trial and post-

sentencing detention centres.24 A debriefing with the UNICEF country office was held at the end of each

country visit. For the non-visited countries and territories, documentary research was complemented by

interviews organised through skype or telephone.

Following field work, country-level ‘effect diagrams’ representing what actually took place were produced.

Country-level diagrams are presented in Annex 2 and the regional effects diagram is presented in the

conclusion section.

4. The synthesis phase which brought together the results of the desk phase and field phase in this final

report. Due to challenges with the original contractor, the work started by the original evaluation team (who

22 The evaluation matrix was slightly modified after approval of the inception report, to reduce the relatively large number of efficiency indicators. Concretely, Indicators 9.2, 10.3, 11.1, 11.3, 11.4, and 11.5 were deleted. 23 The distribution of responses was broadly proportional to population size, although the EU accession countries and territories and Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) had a higher response rate than the others, possibly reflecting a greater internet penetration rate. For reasons, which are not fully understood, no responses were received from Azerbaijan. 24 See figure 20



prepared the first draft report) was completed by the team leader alone, with relatively little input from the

original team. He prepared the final evaluation after several rounds of review and feedback by UNICEF

stakeholders, an independent expert panel,25 and a quality assurance review from an external facility.

In order to test the validity of the chain of effects as outlined in the TOC, the team adopted an approach

based on contribution analysis and the use of a mixed methods approach to the collection and analysis of

data. At the same time, the evaluation team also adopted a gender and human-rights responsive and

culturally sensitive approach together with a forward looking perspective to maximise its usefulness for its

intended users.

Qualitative data collection and analysis allowed for an in-depth understanding and illustration of key issues,

while quantitative data collection and analysis helped to identify overall trends and ensure the integration of

a broader spectrum of information and data. Quantitative and qualitative methods have been used in

parallel. The use of mixed methods enhances the quality and credibility of findings and conclusions through

the convergence and overlap of different data sources and methods of data collection (triangulation). For

further detail on the overall approach and methodological tools, reference should be made to Volume 2,

annex 11.

The information sources and the tools used, as well as the outputs obtained, are summarised in Figure 3. The

approach to data collection and analysis followed a structured process and enabled the team to complement

and cross-check data progressively by relying on different primary and secondary sources of information.

Information gathered through the different sources (literature review of more than 400 documents, semi-

structured interviews with approximately 120 stakeholders in the whole region) was combined and

crosschecked with a view to providing evidence-based answers to the evaluation questions. Volume 2,

annexes 5 and 7 provide respectively the bibliography and the list of people met. Two surveys were also

undertaken. The first solicited anonymous responses from juvenile justice staff in UNICEF offices in all 11

countries and territories. The second, prepared in English, Russian, Montenegrin and Albanian versions, was

distributed to all practitioner contacts in the 11 countries and territories (except for Azerbaijan). 72 responses

were received. The questionnaires and summaries of responses are presented in Annex 9.

25 Mr Dan O’Donnell and Professor Carolyn Hamilton.

4.2. Methodology and tools



Figure 3: Data collection process in desk and field phases

The evaluation faced a number of challenges.

The first cluster of challenges relates to the chosen methodology.

The matrix of evaluation questions, including the judgement criteria and indicators developed by the

evaluation team during the inception phase, were ambitious, with over 230 elements, as well as a

commitment to integrate information on the EIDHR project. The duration of fieldwork (on average

8 days per country) may have realistically been too short to obtain the quantity and range of data

required26.

It proved more difficult than expected to obtain reliable data on spending and costs. The evaluators

therefore did not attempt to answer questions such as how programme costs compare to other

similar programmes or other typical efficiency analysis.

The EIDHR project was implemented between early 2011 and mid-2014, but as specified in the ToR,

this evaluation covers only the period until the end of 2012, at which point the results of the EIDHR

project were not fully observable.

The evaluators and UNICEF faced challenges in attributing UNICEF resources to specific

interventions.

26 Fieldwork was carried out in six countries and desk work in the remaining five.

DESK REVIEW FIELD PHASE

1 Pilot Mission and 5 Field Visits

UNICEF strategy documents Interviews

EC strategy documents Focus groups Information gathered on

National context

Indicators for each

country/territory

Direct observations

Project level documentation

Questionnaire responses analysed

Additional documents reviewed

Assessments of juvenile justice

reforms; Situation Analysis (SITAN);

Country Programme (CPD) ; Annual

Work Plan (AWP); UNICEF -

Government Country Programme

Action Plan (CPAP); UNICEF Annual

Reports

Country Strategy Papers, National

Indicative Programmes

Legislation, regulations, national

statistics, national strategies and

action plans for children/for justice,

crime prevention strategies, youth

criminal procedures

Proposals, progress reports,

evaluation reports, logframes,

workplans

• UNICEF strategies and context

• Relevance of UNICEF strategy

• Implementation and

organisational set-up

• Results, impact and

sustainability of interventions

• Coordination, complementarity

and added value

• Coherence

Documents consulted

Surveys for UNICEF COs and

practitioners

Mapping of interventions,

validated with COs

Identification of data gaps,

reformulation of indicators as

required

• Collect

• Cross-check

• Find solutions for data gaps

and in consistencies

• Reformulation of indicators as

required

Detention centres (Albania, Moldova,

Georgia, Azerbaijan)

Rehabilitation centre (Ukraine)

Juvenile Colony (Ukraine)

UNICEF COs and UNICEF RO

Governments and public Institutions

Juvenile justice practitioners

Civil Society Organisations

Georgia: 1 with social workers and 1

with internal staff of Ministry of interior

Moldova: 1 with lawyers and 1 with

NGOs

Albania: 1 with staff of detention

institution

Ukraine: 1 with children in

rehabilitation centre and 1 with prison

staff

4.3. Challenges and limitations



The evaluation faced significant challenges in obtaining reliable, comparable and disaggregated data

in the area of juvenile justice.

These challenges have inevitably had an impact on the final report, as follows:

The volume, comprehensiveness, diversity and reliability of data collected in the 11 countries and

territories is unequal.

The presentation of findings has been refocused on those areas where the contractor has identified

sufficient information from both primary and secondary sources to triangulate findings.

The scope of conclusions and recommendations reflects the limited scope of the findings, and is more

limited than originally envisaged.


32

This part of the report presents findings for each evaluation question, giving an overview for the countries

and territories covered for the evaluation and, when relevant, presenting examples for particular countries

and territories.

The three main impact measures selected by UNICEF for this evaluation are key indicators of progressive

juvenile justice systems. Detention is a traumatic experience that can harm a child’s development, hamper

their reintegration into society and make it more likely that the child will reoffend in the future. It is a norm

of international law that all children alleged to, or accused of, committing a crime must be presumed innocent

until found guilty and that pre-trial detention before trial should be avoided in all but exceptional

circumstances. The Council of Europe has noted that children ‘deprived of their liberty up to the

commencement of their trial experience all the negative aspects of imprisonment without having yet been

found guilty of committing an offence’.27

In relation to the number of children in detention, there was an overall decline in the total number of

children in detention (pre and post-trial) of almost 60% between 2006 and 2012. There was a slight

acceleration in the decline after 2008, possibly as a result of amnesties and/or the move away from ‘zero

tolerance’ policies in several countries and territories, or the introduction of new programmes and the reform

of juvenile justice.

It should be noted however, that the decline in rates of detention began well before the period of this

evaluation,28 and continued on a steady downward trend during the period covered by this evaluation. While

UNICEF supported reforms in juvenile justice both before and during the period under evaluation, and in

most cases was the only partner supporting the reforms, it has not been possible to make any direct

inferences of UNICEF attribution to the decline in the rates of detention.

The one country that forms an exception is Georgia. The detention rate went up initially at the start of the

evaluation period due to a “zero tolerance” policy which, without the intervention of UNICEF and other

stakeholders, was likely to have lasted for a longer period, leading to a significant increase in the number of

children detained.

27 The Council of Europe Commentary on Recommendation Rec(2003)20 of the Committee of Ministers to member states concerning new ways of dealing with juvenile delinquency and the role of juvenile justice. 28 Partly as a result of previous interventions by UNICEF, the EU and others.

5. FINDINGS OF THE EVALUATION

5.1. To what extent have the results of (1) reducing detention for children in conflict with the law, (2) increasing the use of diversion from the judicial process and (3) reducing the average duration of pre-sentence detention been achieved in each of the country over the period 2006—2012?

5.1.1. Result 1: A decline in detention for children in conflict with the law


33

The results obtained by each of the countries and territories selected for these evaluations are as follows:

Table 2: Reducing detention for children in conflict with the law

Country

(a) reduced deprivation of liberty for children in conflict with the

law

Albania No

Armenia Yes

Azerbaijan Yes

Georgia Yes

Kazakhstan Yes

Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) No

Kyrgyzstan Yes

Moldova Yes

Montenegro Yes

Tajikistan --

Ukraine Yes

Progress/countries &

territories where data

is available 8/10

Note: “–“ indicates that there is insufficient data to assess this result.

The proportion of the juvenile population charged with an offence in the CEE/CIS region declined more

than 22% between 2001 and 2011. The proportion of the juvenile population convicted of an offence also

fell by more than two thirds between 2000 and 2011. These results should be assessed in the context of a

longer-term decline in prosecution and conviction rates (see figure 4, below).

The evaluation took care to interpret results expressed in absolute numbers with caution – taking into

consideration that in many countries the number of adolescents and the proportion of juveniles in the

population has fallen. The countries and territories of the former USSR and Eastern Europe experienced a

decline in their birth rate during the 1990s. Several countries and territories have also experienced net

emigration, particularly to Western Europe and the Russian Federation.

The evaluators compared the detention rates during the period covered by this examination with the crude

birth rate 16 years earlier. This, albeit approximate comparison, is illustrated in the following chart. As can

be clearly seen, the number of detained children has declined faster than the proxy measurement of the

falling number of young teenagers. This would suggest that the decline in the number of detained children

could only partially be explained by demographic changes, and must also be the result of other factors, such

as those examined in this evaluation.


34

Figure 4: Comparison of detention trend with change in juvenile population

Note: change in number of juveniles detained divided by crude birth rate 16 years earlier. Both series rebased: 1990/2006 = 100%

Source: Data on number of juveniles detained compiled from various sources, including Transmonee, UNICEF COs, national statistical

offices and government agencies in the 11 countries and territories. Data on crude birth rate from various sources by World Bank,

http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.CBRT.IN?page=4

The relationship between demographic change and numbers of children detained for the 11 countries and

territories covered by this evaluation is as follows:29

In nine of the eleven countries and territories examined for this evaluation, the number of

children in detention has declined more rapidly than the decline in the number of young people.

In other words, there is a clear decline in the number of children detained and this goes beyond

the results expected from demographic change.

In Azerbaijan, the decline in the number of children and in the absolute number of children

detained is similar, suggesting that there may be no significant decline in the rate of detention.

The fall in the absolute number of children detained may simply be the result of a declining

number of children in society.30

In Albania, the proportion of children in society has fallen, but the number of children detained

has increased In other words, the increase in the rate of detention of children may be more

significant than the increase in the absolute number of children detained.

In Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) the total number of children in pre-sentence detention has risen, but the total number of children serving custodial sentences, and the overall number of children in detention has fallen.

29 Sources for this section: data on number of juveniles detained compiled from various sources, including Transmonee, UNICEF COs, national statistical offices and government agencies in the 11 countries and territories. Data on demographic change from World Bank,

http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.CBRT.IN?page=4 30 It is also possible, however, that the fall happened before 2006.

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Figure 4: Detention trend (adjusted for change in number of juveniles)

Crude birth rates 16 years earlier (Average of national rates) Detained children (Average of national rates)




35

These trends are illustrated in the following chart.

Figure 5: Annual change in number of children in pre- and post-sentencing detention (only for years where

data is available)

Note: Data is not available for all years for all countries. These annual rates refer only to periods or which data is available and cannot necessarily be extrapolated to cover the whole period covered by this evaluation. See tables 2 and 3 for more detailed information. Source: Compiled from various sources, including Transmonee, UNICEF COs and national statistical offices. Evaluators were not able

to identify any data on pre-sentence detention in Tajikistan.

5.1.2. Declining number of children in pre-trial detention

Available data for the 11 countries and territories shows a fall in the placement of children in pre-trial

detention.

The following table summarises available data on the number of children in pre-trial detention. As previously

mentioned, there is a falling trend everywhere except Albania and neighbouring Kosovo (UNSCR 1244). In

Montenegro, there was a rising trend between 2006 and 2011, but a sharp decline in 2012. Declines of more

than 50% can be seen in Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Montenegro and Ukraine.

Table 3: Number of juveniles in pre-sentence/pre-trial detention

Country 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Albania 153 190 195 118 186

Armenia 22 26 17 26 12 16 10

Azerbaijan 38 34 33 26

Georgia 189 130 129 165 60

Kazakhstan 546 494 454 475 268 207 153

Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) 66 74 115 59 74 79

Kyrgyzstan 62 85 29 45 33 30

-15%

-10%

-5%

0%

5%

Alb

ania

Arm

enia

Aze

rbai

jan

Ge

org

ia

Kaz

akh

stan

Ko

sovo

(U

NSC

R 1

24

4)

Kyr

gyzs

tan

Mo

ldo

va

Mo

nte

neg

ro

Tajik

ista

n

Ukr

ain

e

Pre-sentencing Post-sentencing


36

Since 2007, there has been a steady, but modest decline in the number of custodial sentences and in the

percentage of convicted children who serve custodial sentences, as the tables below illustrate. There was a

rise in Albania and a decline everywhere else between 2006 and 2012. There were declines of more than 50%

in Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Montenegro, Tajikistan and Ukraine.

Table 4: Number of juveniles detained in post-sentencing detention facilities

Country 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Albania 237 185 361 253 305 374 271

Armenia 23 31 38 16 22 16 14

Azerbaijan 83 38 33 33 39 36

Georgia 135 219 204 91 139 60

Kazakhstan 460 427 449 427 240 160 116

Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) 24 25 9 17 14 15

Kyrgyzstan 82 99 55 51 49 35 35

Moldova 138 92 24 33 35 32 39

Montenegro 13 11 5 7 7 4 6

Tajikistan 250 265 243 171 179 118 113

Ukraine 1641 1256 1053 927 926 868 751 Source: Albania - CO and own elaborated; Armenia - CO/MoJ; Azerbaijan - EIDHR logframe and country visit; Georgia – Transmonee and Penitentiary Department; Kazakhstan - Ministry of Interior of the RK, Committee of Administrative Police; Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) - Correctional Services/Ministry of Justice; Kyrgyzstan - The State Service for the Execution of Punishment, (SAEP for Coordination Board)provided in March 2014; Moldova – Transmonee; Montenegro – CO, State prosecutor office and Monstat - Annual report; Tajikistan - Assessment of JJ reform 2012 and Council of Justice; Ukraine - State Statistics Department of Ukraine.

Moldova 225 129 159 91 92 98

Montenegro 11 18 10 13 16 27 2

Tajikistan

Ukraine 1774 1682 1469 1344 1173 911 522 Source: Albania - General Directorate of Prisons; Armenia - Ministry of Justice; Azerbaijan - EIDHR logframe and country visit and MoJ; Georgia – 2006,2007 and 2009 Transmonee and 2008 and 2012 Penitentiary Department, Kazakhstan - Ministry of Interior of the RK,Committee of Administrative Police; Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) - Correctional Services/Ministry of Justice; Kyrgyzstan – State Agency on Execution of Punishment ; Moldava – Transmonee; Montenegro - Monstat - Annual reports; Tajikistan – Transmonee; Ukraine - Country visit, Ministry of interior and EIDHR logframe.

5.1.3. Declining use of custodial sentences


37

Figure 6: Children serving custodial sentences as % of all convicted children in the region

Note: For some years, in some countries, data was not available. The above chart is based on simulation using data for the closest year(s) available for Convicted children for Moldova 2012 and for Children in closed facilities post sentence for Azerbaijan 2006 and Georgia 2011. Source: Transmonee and data collected during the field phase, own elaboration, see Annex 10 for more details.

There is a considerable variation in the use of custodial sentences between the 11 countries and territories

as illustrated in the following graph. Albania and Tajikistan showed the most significant decline in the

proportion of convicted juveniles serving custodial sentences, with a significant decline observed in

Kazakhstan from 2010 onwards. Armenia and Kyrgyzstan showed an increase in the proportion of convicted

juveniles serving custodial sentences. Georgia showed an increase in the proportion of convicted juveniles

serving custodial sentences during the application of the ‘zero tolerance’ policy applied in 2006-2007, with a

falling trend thereafter. This means that while there was little decline in Georgia between the first and last

years covered by this evaluation, there was nevertheless a significant decline from 2007 onwards.

Figure 7: Percentage of convicted children serving custodial sentences

Note: Number of children serving custodial sentences at the end of the year, as a proportion of children sentenced during that year.

Source: Transmonee and data collected during the field phase, own elaboration, see Annex 10 for more details.

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Average of national rates Regional rate


38

A detailed breakdown of detention by type of facility is only available for three countries and territories.

There is no clear differentiation in trends between different types of detention. The available data is shown

in the following table.

Table 5: Children in detention by type of facility

Montenegro 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Referral to a community-based correctional

facility

8 19 10 8 8 8 2

Referral to a correctional home 1 - - - - - -

Juvenile detention 13 11 5 7 7 4 6

Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Imprisonment 10 16 4 6 7 8

Educational measure 14 9 4 11 7 7

Ukraine 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Imprisonment 2121 927 926 868 751

Educational measure 6949 4985 5468 4220 5803 4037 4701 Source of data: UNICEF Country Offices and for Ukraine, the State Penal Service of Ukraine; Ministry of Interior

The CRC requires that States should ensure that ‘whenever appropriate and desirable, measures for dealing

with such children [i.e. children in conflict with the law] without resorting to judicial proceedings’ are in

place.31 This is generally referred to as ‘diversion’. The majority of children in the criminal justice system are

charged with a minor property offence and will never offend again and, as such, diversion is a way of

minimising children’s contact with the criminal justice system. The UN guidelines require that the police,

prosecution and other agencies dealing with young people’s cases shall be empowered to dispose of such

cases, at their discretion, without recourse to formal hearings.32 Thereby avoiding ‘a first or early contact

with the criminal justice system by directing children away from the formal justice system and prosecution

towards community support and appropriate services or interventions.’33

Amongst the countries studied, the proportion of children in conflict with the law who were diverted from

court almost doubled during the period of this evaluation.34 Although the increase in the use of diversion

is significant, the trend fluctuated. Improvements in 2006-2008 appear to have been cancelled out in 2009

and 2010, but were then followed by a strong and sustained improvement in recent years. There were no

countries or territories where diversion was established or expanded without a significant and

comprehensive UNICEF engagement specifically in support of diversion. Indeed the great majority of

stakeholders considered that UNICEF was the initiator and catalyst of diversion reforms.

31 Article 40(3)(b) UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. 32 Beijing Rules, No.11; Riyadh Guide- lines, No.58 33 Commentary to the Beijing Rules (1985), Section 11 34 Comparison is made with number of convictions plus number of diversions. This metric is chosen because data on number of prosecutions (the metric originally selected) is not available in the majority of countries and territories examined. The increase in the percentage of children diverted continued in 2013, after the end of the period covered by this evaluation.

5.1.4. Detention by type of facility

5.1.5. Result 2: Increased use of diversion from the judicial process


39

Table 6: Increase in the use of diversion from judicial proceedings

Country (b) increasing the use of diversion from the judicial process

Albania Yes

Armenia --

Azerbaijan Yes

Georgia Yes

Kazakhstan --

Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) Yes

Kyrgyzstan --

Moldova --

Montenegro Yes

Tajikistan No

Ukraine No



is available 5/7

Note: “–“ indicates that there is insufficient data to assess this result.

Diversion is the process of diverting an arrested child from judicial proceedings, before the trial. However,

the definition of ‘diversion’ and the range of diversion schemes varied between the countries and territories

covered by this evaluation.35 Indeed, data from the various countries and territories does not consistently

use this definition.36 Nevertheless, an overall trend can be calculated using the numbers of children diverted

and the numbers of children convicted. This trend is shown in the following table.

Table 7: Percentage of children who enter a pre-sentence diversion scheme as a percentage of children

accused of a crime

Country 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013

Albania 27.8% 34.9% 31.1% 37.3%

Azerbaijan 15.9% 25.6% 28.4% 33.9%

Georgia 0.2% 10.9% 20.7% 42.0%

Kazakhstan 10.9% 15.4% 23.0%

Kosovo (UNSCR

1244) 19.3% 47.3% 32.9% 37.5% 56.1% 48.1% 44.1%

Montenegro 1.2% 1.1% 26.3% 38.2% 47.6%

35 In most countries national stakeholders share UNICEF’s understanding of ‘diversion’ as diversion from judicial proceedings; therefore taking place before the first trial hearing. In some countries, however, ‘diversion’ is sometimes taken to include forms of alternative procedure instigated after the start of judicial proceedings, or post trial but before sentencing of those convicted. In some countries, statistics for diversion may include cases dismissed, which would not correspond to UNICEF’s understanding of ‘diversion.’ REALLY? The broadest de facto definition was used (until recent reforms) in Kazakhstan, where legislation did not refer to ‘diversion’ as such, but where ‘mediation’, ‘reconciliation’ and ‘closure of the case’ were used to cover a broad range of deviation, mediation and alternative sentencing procedures. 36 TransMonee does not use the indicator ‘cases diverted’, and official data on diversion is rare. Some respondents suggested that data compiled by some UNICEF offices on ‘diversion’ includes children sent to ‘diversion centres’, including those who are not accused of any crime and/or are too young to be prosecuted. This would inflate the number of cases ‘diverted’. In addition, cases of children referred for anti-social behaviour are thought to be more numerous that cases of children referred following accusation of an offence. Referral for anti-social behaviour could be categorised as prevention, not diversion.


40

Tajikistan 14.2% 20.6% 16.7% 18.6% 8.9% 19.7% 11.9%

Ukraine 19.6% 22.0% 18.6% 22.0% 14.0%

Average 14.2% 20.0% 27.9% 20.5% 16.7% 25.3% 26.7% 38.1% Source: Albania - CO PPT; Azerbaijan - Elaborated on data from EIDHR logaframe and Transmonee; Georgia - CO PPT; Kazakhstan - Ministry of the Interior of the RK; Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) - Probation Services/Ministry of Justice; Montenegro - Supreme State Prosecutor's Office; Tajikistan - CO from Prosecutor's; Ukraine - Ministry of Interior

Due to gaps in available data for some countries and territories, the trend across all eight countries and

territories for which some data is available can only be calculated reliably for the years 2010-2012. As the

following graph illustrates, the trend is clearly positive.

Figure 8: Percentage of children diverted from court (eight countries and territories)

Note: graph shows proportion of children diverted as proportion of all children accused of committing a crime. Source: Compiled from various sources including Transmonee, UNICEF COs and government agencies. For Albania, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Montenegro and Tajikistan the graph shows percentage of children diverted as proportion of all diverted plus all convicted. For Kosovo (1244) and Ukraine percentage figures were provided by UNICEF.

There is considerable variation in the trends observed in each of the countries and territories, as the following

graph illustrates.37 There was a slight decline in the proportion of children diverted in Tajikistan and Ukraine,

though in both countries, the trend fluctuates. Otherwise there was a significant increase in the proportion

of children diverted in all other countries and territories for which data is available. The most significant

increases are in Montenegro (starting in 2009, when only three children were diverted) and Georgia (where

diversion was not used before 2010).

Stakeholders consistently stated that diversion and community-based alternatives to detention are generally

less accessible to children from the poorest backgrounds; and that the availability of alternatives and relevant

services is also lower in rural areas.38 In several countries and territories, stakeholders reported that juvenile

justice reforms are essentially confined to the capital city. Some stakeholders suggest that this constitutes a

form of discrimination against rural children, other stakeholders commented that it reflects the much lower

37 Each country and territory uses a somewhat different definition of pre-sentence diversion. The availability and reliability of statistics also varies considerably. Nevertheless, even if the absolute proportion of children ‘diverted’ cannot be directly compared, the trends are likely to be significant, insofar as each country and territory is consistent in its definition used to calculate data for each of the years presented here. 38 However, the UNICEF country office in Georgia does not consider such lack of equitable access to be a significant issue in the Georgian context.

16.7%

25.3%26.7%

10%

20%

30%

2010 2011 2012


41

rates of juvenile offending in rural areas: it is difficult to justify the cost of setting up a scheme when then are

too few children to fill it.

The Albanian Helsinki Committee claimed that diversion is not consistently used by all the courts

in the country (courts in rural areas tend to use it less). UNICEF country office staff reported that

diversion and alternative sentencing for juveniles in conflict with the law is working better in

urban areas, especially in big cities.

Figure 9: Ratio of children who enter a diversion scheme, in comparison with number of children who are

convicted (country trends)

Source: Compiled from various sources including Transmonee, UNICEF COs and government agencies. Each country has usable data

for four or five of the years examined, except for Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) and Tajikistan which have data for seven years. For Albania,

Azerbaijan, Georgia, Montenegro and Tajikistan the graph shows percentage of children diverted as proportion of diverted plus

convicted, calculated for this evaluation. For Kosovo (1244) and Ukraine percentage figures were provided by UNICEF.

Not only has the use of detention itself declined, but there has also been a decline, though to a lesser extent,

in the duration of pre-sentence detention. The CRC requires that any deprivation of liberty should be for the

shortest appropriate period of time, and this applies just as much to pre-sentence detention as it does to a

custodial sentence. The two tables below show that in four out of 10 countries for which data is available a

decline in the length of pre-sentence detention of children during the period 2006-2012 was recorded

(Moldova, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan and Montenegro).

Table 8: Average duration of pre-sentence detention

5.1.6. Result 3: A decline in the duration of pre-sentence detention


42

Country

reduced the average duration of pre-sentence

detention

Albania No

Armenia Yes

Azerbaijan No

Georgia No

Kazakhstan No

Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) No

Kyrgyzstan Yes

Moldova Yes

Montenegro Yes

Tajikistan --

Ukraine No



is available 4/10

Figure 10: Annual change in length of pre-sentence juvenile detention (only for years where data is

available)

Source: Compiled from various sources including Transmonee, UNICEF COs and government agencies.

The lowest average length of detention is in Ukraine (one month) and Montenegro (2-3 weeks). The average

length of juvenile detention in Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) and Kyrgyzstan fluctuated between one and three

months, with Kazakhstan stable at 4 months and Azerbaijan at a slightly lower level. In Albania, the average

length of detention rose to 202 days in 2012. A significant and sustained decline was observed in Moldova,

where the average length of detention fell from an estimated 540 days in 2006 to an estimated 90 days in

2010, representing a decline of over 83%.

Table 9: Average length of pre-sentence juvenile detention in days

Country 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Albania

Armenia

Azerbaijan

GeorgiaKazakhstan

Kosovo (UNSCR 1244)

Kyrgyzstan

Montenegro

Moldova

Ukraine

-15%

-10%

-5%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%


43

Albania 140 184 174 177 202

Armenia 62 69 53 69 84 97 45

Azerbaijan 98 104 132

Georgia 180 180 180 180 180 180 180

Kazakhstan 120 125

Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) 26 102 87 48 76 56

Kyrgyzstan 83 83 60

Montenegro 18 27 15 27 17 21 15

Moldova 540 300 300 270 120 150 90

Ukraine 30 30 30 30 30 30 30

Average 166 105 117 118 92 104 94

Regional trend

(2006=100%) 100% 63% 71% 71% 55% 62% 56%

Source: Compiled from various sources including Transmonee, UNICEF COs and government agencies.

Despite the fall in some countries, the length of pre-sentence detention is still long. The CRC considers that

detention before and during trial should not exceed 6 months.39 In Armenia, the average length of pre-

sentence detention is 6.7 months, and in Georgia it is six months. In both countries, given the average length

of pre-trial detention, it is likely that a considerable proportion of juveniles in pre-trial detention are detained

for longer than 6 months. The average length of pre-trial detention In Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Georgia is

more than four months; here too, some children may be spending unacceptably long periods in pre-trial

detention.

It should be noted that Georgia and Ukraine declared the same average length of pre-trial detention in every

year covered by this evaluation, as a result of which the data must be viewed as potentially unreliable.

The evaluators did not detect any significant trends in the relative importance of different lengths of

detention for the four countries and territories for which data was available. Among these, Albania is the

country with the largest proportion of children detained for >6 months and >12 months.40

While attributing changes in the number of children placed in pre-sentence detention to UNICEF is not

possible, the evaluation found that reductions in the length of pre-sentence detention were associated with

evidence of significant UNICEF support. Interestingly, there was a negative relationship between the increase

in diversion and the length of pre-sentence detention: the countries with a greater level of diversion kept

children in pre-sentence detention for a longer period of time. This should not be regarded as altogether

surprising. It is highly likely that in countries with more diversion, the children who are detained pre-sentence

have committed serious offences, which nearly always result in longer periods of pre-sentence detention

than minor offences.

Some stakeholders expressed dissatisfaction with the overall coverage, accuracy and timeliness of available

statistics on the use of custody and, in some countries and territories, there were significant discrepancies

39 Specifically, the CRC provides that legal proceedings should not last more than six months, which of necessity limits detention before and during proceedings.) 40 The available data is presented in Annex 10.

5.1.7. Stakeholders’ perceptions of trends in the above indicators


44

between the data provided by different stakeholders. Nevertheless, the great majority of stakeholders

confirmed the above trends.

In Albania, stakeholders clearly identified socio-economic factors as being the main reason for increased

numbers of children in detention and an increase in the period of time served in detention.

In Albania, all interviewed stakeholders41 indicated that, irrespective of the data trends, the

willingness to detain children is lower than in the past. The Directorate of Prisons also stressed

that these indicators should be interpreted in the context of an overall increase in criminal

activities in Albania since 2008, as a result of socio-economic difficulties. The reasons identified

by stakeholders for the extended duration of pre-trial detention vary significantly. While the

Prosecutor’s Office and the Judges believed that the delay was due to an overload of cases in the

courts, NGOs consider that a misinterpretation of the term “best interest of the child” is the main

cause. It is alleged that judges and prosecutors overuse pre-trial detention and consider it to be

a correctional measure in the best interest of the child. UNICEF staff, NGOs and staff in Kavaia

Juvenile Detention Centre pointed out that, as a consequence of the protracted pre-trial

detention, many juveniles who are convicted end up spending the entire duration of their

sentence in pre-trial detention42. They expressed concern that, in order to avoid appeals, children

are given a sentence that reflects the time that they spent in pre-trial detention, rather than the

shorter sentence it is likely they would have been given if they had not been detained pre-trial. In

several countries, stakeholders expressed concerns that officials are not effectively using the

existing possibilities available to them to reduce the length of pre-sentence detention.

The proportion of girls among detainees is consistently low (except in some of the smaller countries and

territories, where the small absolute numbers of children in detention can cause statistical fluctuations).43

This reflects global trends and is not specific to this region.

41 Ministry of Justice, General Directorate of Prisons (MoJ), Ministry of Internal Affairs – Police, Ministry of Education and Sport, EU Delegation, SIDA, Centre for Legal Integrated Practices, Save the Children, Meridia, Albanian Foundation for Conflict Resolution and Mediation, Albanian Helsinki Committee, General Attorney's Office, Judge in the Juvenile section of the Court in Tirana, Tirana Prosecutor Office, Staff in Kavaja Juvenile Detention Centre, General Director of Probation

42 In 2012 the UN Human Rights Committee similarly expressed concern with “the continued use of pre-trial detention of children who might spend

months in detention without access to education, psychological support and reintegration measures and the fact that 70 percent of convicted

juveniles will have spent their sentence in detention while awaiting their trial.” 43 The small absolute numbers mean that the scale of statistical trends is more dramatic; care should be taken not to overestimate the importance of small changes in the absolute numbers of children concerned.

5.2. To what extent have the above three results differently affected (1) boys and girls, (2) various age groups (under 14; 14-15; 16-17) and (3) the most vulnerable groups of children, including those from ethnic minorities or from families with lower income or in difficult circumstances?

5.2.1. Detention by gender


45

The proportion of girls among pre-sentence detainees remained low throughout the period of the evaluation:

fewer than 5% in Albania and Georgia, and fewer than 10% (with a possible downward trend) in Armenia and

Kazakhstan.

Among juveniles serving custodial sentences, the proportion of girls is relatively constant and low. In

Montenegro it fluctuates between 4.5 and 18.2%, but on a very low number of cases. In Armenia, the

available statistics report the proportion of girls serving custodial sentences as fluctuating between 0% and

6.0%. In Ukraine, the fluctuation is between 3.4% and 6.2%

Overall, the data available for a disaggregated analysis of detention by gender is extremely limited.44

The quality of detention facilities is not addressed by this evaluation. Nevertheless, the evaluators note that

as girls are generally a small proportion of the detained children, there are rarely separate facilities for them

and they are generally placed with adult women, possibly resulting in poorer conditions of detention than

those for boys. 45 The low absolute number of girl detainees is generally considered by the states covered in

this evaluation as justifying a lack of provision of dedicated facilities. Even where decision makers could be

persuaded to make the significant financial commitments needed to ensure equitable treatment, the logistic

challenges are considerable. Yet, without dedicated facilities, girls may be left without access to appropriate

specific educational or rehabilitative facilities. Stakeholders did not consider that holding girls together with

adult women carried the same risks as holding boys together with adult men, and were sceptical regarding

the possibility of reform, considering the low absolute numbers of girls concerned.

In Armenia, very few and sometimes no girls were detained at any given time; there were no

dedicated facilities: when girls were placed in detention they were held together with adults in the

women’s prison.46

In Kyrgyzstan, the dedicated juvenile detention facility (‘child colony’) is only for boys. According to

the UNICEF country office, “girls are placed in the women’s colony – [the authorities] tried to make

a separate colony for them but found that there were only a few – so they were put in a separate

section [of the women’s colony]. They are only there for a very heavy crime – so usually there are

only 1 -3 of them. No girls are placed in special schools.”47

UNICEF did not have any significant impact on improving conditions for girls or in reducing the equity gap for

girls in terms of conditions. In order to address the equity gap, any new programme should consider further

alternatives to custody or providing small, regionally based, therapeutic units in which girls can serve a

custodial sentence. There appears to be little knowledge or adherence to the Bangkok Rules48 in relation to

girls amongst stakeholders.

44 Only four countries and territories have gender disaggregated annual data for the period 2006 or 2007 onwards, and this either for pre-sentence detention (Albania and Armenia, though for the second country data for 2006-2009 reports zero girls in detention) or post-sentence detention (Armenia, Montenegro and Ukraine). Other data is fragmentary. In total, data could only be identified for five of the eleven countries and territories examined. This should caution against excessive reliance on statistical data in the analysis of gender issues in juvenile justice. 45 However, interviewed stakeholders in Albania expressed the opinion that conditions for detained females, including girls, are better than those of their male counterparts. 46 O’Donnell (2010) Assessment of Juvenile Justice Reform Achievements in Armenia, UNICEF Regional Office for for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia 47 Interview with UNICEF CO 21.04.14

48 United Nations Rules for the Treatment of Women Prisoners and Non-custodial Measures for Women Offenders (the Bangkok Rules) A/RES/65/229 16 March 2011

5.2.2. Detention by age


46

The data collected is insufficient to identify longer-term or cross-country trends regarding the age of juveniles

in detention.49

In all countries and territories, the majority, and in some cases all stakeholders considered that the detention

rates do not reveal any ethnic discrimination.50 This view was shared by UNICEF staff members. Issues of

ethno-linguistic, racial and religious discrimination are virtually absent from the discourse of practitioners

interviewed for this evaluation, despite some of the countries and territories having a sizeable Roma

population, and other ethnic minorities who are widely recognised as being subject to discrimination.

UNICEF staff and juvenile justice stakeholders consistently identified socio-economic factors and proximity

to family members already in conflict with the law as the fundamental, and these were often regarded as the

only relevant criteria for the understanding of vulnerability and discrimination issues. The more complex and

nuanced assessment of vulnerability and marginalisation that is formally promoted by UNICEF is largely

absent in day-to-day practice across the region.51

In several countries and territories, UNICEF began programmatic work without first undertaking a full

analysis of the situation of children in conflict with the law and the national context, although analyses of

the juvenile justice system were undertaken of all countries at some point during the period of the project.

As a result, programming was not always strategic in terms of answering what was needed in the local

context and how that should be best addressed. Clear goals were not often set or translated into operational

work plans. Programmatic activity appeared to reflect ad hoc requests from government counterparts,

opportunities to leverage funds from other donors, and/or a replication of higher level UNICEF policies, rather

than a strategy for improving the situation for children in each country context.

The ability to be flexible and develop good relationships with the partner country governments is crucial to

the success of the programmatic work in order to mitigate against gaps in the financial resources available

or lack of government engagement on the relevant issues. Insofar as all countries and territories did pay

increasing attention to UNICEF’s priorities, strategic alignment seems to have taken place. Nevertheless,

UNICEF’s apparent low attention to strategic planning and results-based monitoring was likely to have limited

UNICEF’s impact. Since there was little benchmarking at the beginning of programmes, there was a lack of

available qualitative and quantitative indicators of success, which led to a corresponding difficulty in

monitoring and reporting.

49 A disaggregated analysis of the age distribution of detained children is only possible for two countries and territories, only for pre-trial/pre-sentence detention, and only for half of the period covered by this evaluation. 50 . Interviews in Azerbaijan did suggest that Roma might be over-represented, but as overall numbers of detained juveniles were small, this may not be statistically significant. 51 The number of country office staff interviewed is relatively small. Within this sample, no significant difference in perceptions was noted between national and international staff.

5.2.3. Vulnerable groups

5.3. How relevant was UNICEF’s approach to juvenile justice (at regional and country levels) in meeting the needs and promoting the rights of the most vulnerable?

5.3.1. How comprehensive was UNICEF’s situation analysis?


47

Armenia: a study for UNICEF in 2010 concluded that “UNICEF’s approach to juvenile justice during

the time between the situation analysis and the assessment mission (2001–2009) was not

strategic, in the sense that it was not based on a clearly identified set of long- and medium-term

objectives, assessment of risks and opportunities, identification of a comprehensive set of

activities and agreement as to the roles of diverse counterparts etc.”52

Kyrgyzstan: UNICEF work in juvenile justice in Kyrgyzstan seems to have evolved organically,

without a ‘governing’ strategic document. Nevertheless several stakeholders considered

UNICEF’s work to support development of the Children’s Code as an appropriate – de facto –

strategic choice.

Poverty-related factors associated with children in conflict with the law, were systematically addressed by

UNICEF. In addition, in most countries and territories, UNICEF provided an explicit analysis of gender

inequalities in juvenile justice.53 However, other forms of discrimination and equity were less

systematically treated, reflecting to some extent a lack of disaggregated data and a general perception

among stakeholders that there is little or no discrimination on the basis of ethnicity and language.

However, in some countries and territories, gender issues are addressed weakly or intermittently.

Azerbaijan: in discussion with the evaluators, neither UNICEF nor the majority of stakeholders

interviewed appeared to have any specific agenda to target girls (who are only rarely sentenced

to detention or appear in the diversion centre). Some NGO stakeholders suggested that the

number of girls in conflict with the law is large enough to justify specific attention within the

diversion system.

The great majority of UNICEF’s situation analyses and programme documentation reflect a consistent UNICEF

concern with human rights and gender inequalities. There is a generalised and systematic concern with the

human rights of children, particularly regarding protection from violence and access to education. Otherwise,

there is relatively little analysis of the needs and vulnerabilities of marginalised groups in the UNICEF

programme documentation reviewed for this evaluation.

In Albania, most Annual Work Plans make general reference to ‘vulnerable families and children’,

‘disabled children’ and ‘children at risk.’ However, there is neither specific consideration for

these groups within juvenile justice itself, nor any further identification of which other

marginalized groups there might be. The term ‘marginalized group’ does not appear in the

documentation.

The last Ukraine situation analysis was carried out in 2005. The country office has recently

prepared a ToR for a new situation analysis of child vulnerability in terms of disability, street

52 O’Donnell (2010) Assessment of Juvenile Justice Reform Achievements in Armenia, UNICEF Regional Office for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia 53 See, for example, the Country Programme Action Plan between the Government of Georgia and UNICEF (2011-2015. “During the evaluation period, related to the priorities of the child welfare reform, UNICEF Georgia supported a qualitative assessment of the status of men and women. The purpose of the assessment was to identify the key gender impact areas of the Strengthening Child Care Services and Systems project as well as remaining gaps. The assessment has specifically looked at a gender equality and gender balance among the children in formal state care, child care professionals, service providers and the caregivers. Similar to the gender assessment of the 2006-2010 UNICEF Country Program, this assessment concluded that overall the UNICEF Team has ensured the systematic incorporation of gender mainstreaming throughout the project.” (Country Programme Action Plan Between the Government of Georgia and UNICEF (2011-2015))

5.3.2. Vulnerability and marginalisation issues within UNICEF’s programme design


48

living and social vulnerability. Children in conflict with the law are considered as a vulnerable

group en bloc.54

Since vulnerable, marginalised and discriminated groups are not always identified, the UNICEF juvenile justice

programme rationale, activities, outputs and outcomes could not be said to be explicitly linked to the

identified needs of these groups. The documentation reviewed for this evaluation did not identify efforts by

UNICEF to establish equity baselines, or where feasible to assess the equity effect of specific interventions.

With the exception of gender parity, UNICEF documentation does not indicate significant participation of

vulnerable, marginalised and discriminated groups in programme design consultations and implementation

or recognition of the culturally specific differences and needs of children from different groups.

The amount and quality of data available to UNICEF varies, with some limitations in all countries and

territories covered by this evaluation, particularly with respect to disaggregated data.

All groups of stakeholders interviewed for this evaluation share an explicit definition of “social vulnerability”

and “disadvantaged”. These categories are understood in similar ways by UNICEF and national stakeholders.

Children in conflict with the law are identified as a vulnerable category in UNICEF’s broader analysis but

without the necessary detailed and nuanced analysis that would reflect best practice.

There is a common understanding amongst all stakeholders about who are the marginalized (‘socially

vulnerable’) children, most likely to come into contact with the legal system. For example, interviews in

Georgia, Moldova and Tajikistan identified the same groups: children lacking parental care, including families

with low education levels, orphans and street children; children from low income families; children exposed

to violence and neglect in the family, including those with parents with substance abuse problems, and

children from families containing currently or formerly imprisoned or convicted members. The perception of

who constitutes a marginalised child is perhaps surprising in countries which have minorities known to be

the subject of discrimination.

Within this common operational definition, there are obviously many nuances between stakeholders and

between countries. In Moldova and Kyrgyzstan, absence of parents because of labour migration was often

cited as a cause of vulnerability.

In 2011, UNICEF reported that, in the Albanian system, children in conflict with law are identified

as vulnerable as a category. No effort is in place to identify equity issues or further vulnerability,

marginalisation and discrimination within this group.55

In Georgia, neither in documentation nor in interviews did UNICEF make significant use of the

concept of ‘marginalised groups.’56 UNICEF staff more often use the terms ‘social vulnerability’

and ‘disadvantage’, based primarily on financial difficulties.57 In particular, the evaluators were

told that poor families often can’t pay the bail or financial sanctions to avoid or shorten the

54 Terms of Reference for SITAN on Children and Women, to be carried out in 2014 55 CONFIDENTIAL: UNICEF comments on Child Rights Issues in Albania. A report presented to the 60th Pre-sessional Working Group of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, UNICEF Albania CO, December 2011, pg.6-7 56 In December 2014 UNICEF staff reported that the concept of marginalised groups will be expanded in the next country programme. 57 The term ‘social vulnerability’ appears frequently in UNICEF documents, e.g. UNICEF, Assessment of Juvenile Justice Reform Achievements in Georgia, 2010, pages 24; UNICEF, Assessment in probation in Georgia, 2011, pages. 23, 54, 55, 73 and 80

5.3.3. Operational definitions of the ‘marginalised’ and ‘socially vulnerable’


49

detention of their child.58 Among other stakeholders, ethnicity is not believed to be a factor of

marginalization or discrimination.59

UNICEF’s interventions were designed with a view to contributing to the broader rule of law and justice

sector reform agendas implemented by Governments. This is clearly reflected in key documentation, and

is recognised by all interviewed stakeholders. UNICEF also developed a strategic relationship with the EU in

the region (for the EU, the ENPI-East Region and the Eurasian part of the DCI region). The juvenile justice

interventions fit within pre-accession and development cooperation frameworks between the EU and the

countries of Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

As part of this evaluation, an internet-based survey of practitioners asked “is there any issue or priority that

has not been tackled by the reform of juvenile justice since 2006?” 60 Responses suggest that the overall

direction of juvenile justice reform in the region corresponds to the priorities shared by a large majority of

juvenile justice stakeholders. The only issues cited by more than 10% of respondents as somewhat lacking in

the programme, were reintegration, more attention to implementation of measures already adopted, and

more attention to diversion. Almost 20% stated that all issues and priorities had been tackled.

In Albania, donor partners considered that UNICEF had made a continuous effort to incorporate

juvenile justice into the Justice Sector Reform. Close collaboration in this regard was reported with

relevant Ministries (e.g. Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Internal Affairs) and with other

international organisations/institutions (e.g. OSCE and Council of Europe). UNICEF programming

since 2007 is part of the One UN Program – Albania. This implies coordination and complementing

strategies within the Albanian Government, with other UN agencies active in the Rule of Law/justice

sector (e.g. UNODC) and with other international stakeholders supporting the Albanian Government

in the European integration process (e.g. EU, OSCE, Council of Europe, bilateral European donors).61

In Armenia, UNICEF’s interventions correspond closely with the juvenile justice section of the

National Plan of Action for the Republic of Armenia for the protection of the rights of the child (2004-

2015), The National Action Plan included as one of its three juvenile justice aims “the protection of

the legal rights of juveniles who appear to be in a difficult situation” and as four of its six juvenile

justice programme objectives “to consider wider application of alternative penalties which do not

isolate offenders from society,” “to reduce the number of juveniles in penitentiary institutions,” “to

strengthen cooperation among the main bodies of the state, the statistical and the penitentiary

services,” and “to make issues related to the protection of juvenile offenders public.”

58 Georgia: interview with UNICEF Country Office 59 Georgia: interviews with prosecutors, judges, Legal Aid Service, MoES, MoJ, MoLHSA, National Probation Agency 60 UNICEF juvenile justice Practitioner Survey Q6. For further detail about the questionnaire, and the practitioners involved, see Vol 2 Annex 9 of this report 61 UN/Government of Albania, One United Nations Programme Albania. Programme Framework Document, 2007-2010 (pg 2; 17; 19 )

5.4. To what extent were UNICEF’s juvenile justice interventions relevant to the broader rule of law and justice sector reform agendas implemented by Governments, the EU, bilateral donors, the UN and other actors?

5.4.1. Stakeholder perception of the relevance of juvenile justice reforms in their countries and territories


50

In Kazakhstan, the interventions are aligned with the legislative reforms schedule of the Government

and Parliament, in line with major justice programmes such as the Juvenile Justice System

Development Concept (2009-2011), and the Legal Policy Development Concept (2010-2020).

In the great majority of countries and territories, stakeholders perceive a high or very high degree of

alignment of UNICEF’s support with that of other donors. UNICEF Programme design documentation

systematically considers opportunities to coordinate and complement the strategies and interventions of

other stakeholders in the rule of law/justice sectors (donors, government, NGOs etc.) and avoid

duplication.

This evaluation selected for closer examination the relationship between UNICEF and the European Union in

the countries covered by this evaluation.

UNICEF is a major beneficiary of EU funding to promote child needs and child rights in the countries and

territories covered by this evaluation. The following table analyses EU grant-based and project-based funding

for child rights and needs in the nine countries selected for this evaluation which are covered by the ENPI

and DCI instruments. Juvenile justice is the most important sector, representing 22% of financial resources

of the EU child rights portfolio in these countries. UNICEF implements 56% of these juvenile justice projects

funded by the EU, but these represent 91% of the funds allocated to juvenile justice in the region by the EU.

The other 44% of juvenile justice projects (representing 9% of the financial resources the EU allocates to this

sector in this region), are mostly implemented by partnerships of European and partner country NGOs. As

can be seen, UNICEF is responsible for implementing all but a small part of the EU spending on juvenile justice

and this has given them significant influence in reform of the juvenile justice.

Table 10: EU financial support to juvenile justice reform in the nine ENPI and DCI countries covered by this

evaluation

via UNICEF Other implementer Total

Sector Projects %EUR Projects %EUR Projects EUR % EUR

Culture 0% 0% 100% 100% 6 €2,546,352 7%

Education 4% 14% 96% 86% 24 €3,466,981 9%

Health 30% 87% 70% 13% 10 €3,215,124 9%

Justice 56% 91% 44% 9% 18 €8,181,416 22%

Labour 50% 85% 50% 15% 2 €1,032,160 3%

Promotion of

rights 7% 11% 93% 89% 15 €3,273,389 9%

Social/welfare

services 44% 89% 56% 11% 9 €3,214,816 9%

Violence 5% 24% 95% 76% 19 €6,806,463 18%

Voice 0% 0% 100% 100% 3 €1,268,929 3%

Vulnerable 11% 35% 89% 65% 28 €4,178,244 11%

5.4.2. UNICEF alignment with donors


51

Total €37,183,874 100%

Source: EuropeAid, 122 projects identified as relevant to child rights. Sector allocation calculated for this study

Justice is also the largest sector within the

portfolio of EU funded UNICEF projects in these

nine countries as figure 10 illustrates.

Some UNICEF priorities correspond more

closely to EU bilateral/geographic

programming, others to global EU programmes.

The period covered by this evaluation saw a

significant consolidation of the EU’s support for

child rights.

In 2006, the European Commission proposed to

establish a comprehensive EU strategy to

effectively promote and safeguard the rights of

the child in the European Union's internal and

external policies and to support Member States’

efforts in this field. These were followed in 2007

by “EU guidelines for the promotion and

protection of the rights of the child” and the EU

Council Conclusion on the “Promotion and protection of the rights of the child in the European Union's

external action – the development and humanitarian dimensions” (2008).

In the first phase of the implementation of the guidelines, the EU decided to concentrate specifically and

exclusively on combating violence against children (including sexual violence and exploitation, trafficking,

alleged conflict with the law, child labour), with a pilot programme in countries from different continents.

The objectives was to "support country-specific action to prevent and combat all forms of violence against

children, taking into account the different forms of violence against children in the various countries/regions

of the world".

The main instruments identified by the Council of the European Union for the purpose of a tailor-made

response to children’s rights, with a specific focus on girls, are the thematic programme Investing In People

(IiP) and the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR). UNICEF has received financial

support under both programmes, in the form of targeted projects, as well as through successful participation

in competitive calls for proposals. The Council Conclusions state that "EU actions on the rights of the child

should also find synergies with the overall efforts carried out by the United Nations, in particular UNICEF, UN

human rights mechanisms including special procedures and treaty bodies, in particular the Committee on the

Rights of the Child".

In February 2011 the European Commission adopted a policy orientation document "EU Agenda for the rights

of the child." which for the first time incorporated internal and external aspect of EU policy. The Agenda

aimed at "reinforcing the rights of child by putting the principles of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights into

practice". It lists 11 actions that the Commission is expected to take over to protect children's rights, including

promoting child-friendly justice, and better informing children about their rights.

Figure 11: EU project-based funding of UNICEF in 9

selected ENPI and DCI countries

Source: EuropeAid, 122 projects identified as relevant to child rights, in the

nine ENPI and DCI countries covered by this evaluation, for the period 2006-

2012 . Sector allocation calculated for this study

Justice41%

Social/welfare services

16%

Health16%

Violence 9%

Vulnerable8%

Labour5%

Education 3%

Promotion of rights

2%


52

The extensive EU-UNICEF cooperation in this region, and the focus on juvenile justice, reflects the importance

of rights and governance issues in the EU relationship with the countries and territories covered by the

European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument (ENPI), and the EU financial support available to these

countries and territories. UNICEF has recognised the importance of the EU enlargement and ‘eastern’

neighbourhood policy, for instance through the placement of a regional office partnership manager in

Brussels. UNICEF has also tried to leverage the considerable funds that the EU makes available for pre-

accession and development cooperation assistance, through proposing for example targets and indicators

relevant to juvenile justice reform to be considered as part of EU budget support operations.

The evaluation largely validated the key achievements reported by UNICEF in their report: Juvenile Justice in

The CEE/CIS Regions, Progress, Challenges and Opportunities in 2013 which included that significant progress

has been made in bringing the system into line with international and European standards.

Trends for the group of 11 countries and territories are discussed both above and below. All of these findings

show a move towards the implementation of international standards on juvenile justice. However, while the

reform process supported by UNICEF has resulted in all the 11 countries taking steps towards a specialised

juvenile justice system, there are still many more steps to be taken. The international requirements in

relation to juvenile justice remain a challenge for virtually every State and require a longer term programme

commitment by UNICEF if international standards are to be fully implemented.

As stated above in part 1.3, UNICEF uses ten key determinants to analyse system change. The evaluation

sought to evaluate the role of each determinant and the extent to which each contributed to or impeded

impact on the number of children in detention, the use of diversion and the duration of pre-sentence

detention.

a) Social norms

In most countries and territories, there was evidence of change to social norms. In particular, there was a measurable increase in recognition of rehabilitation as the appropriate approach to deal with young offenders among all categories of juvenile justice professionals. In some countries and territories, stakeholders perceive a change in social norms in society at large. In almost all countries and territories, stakeholders perceive some positive change in the portrayal of rehabilitation within the media.

5.5. To what extent has the reform process supported by UNICEF contributed to the development of specialized juvenile justice systems in line with international and European standards?

5.6. To what extent have determinants contributed to or impeded. impact on the number of children in detention, the use of diversion and the duration of pre-sentence detention

5.6.1. Enabling environment


53

An online survey for this evaluation62 asked practitioners about the change in social attitude in relation to the use of rehabilitation amongst different groups of professionals within the juvenile justice system. The results indicated that practitioners believe that the greatest change in social attitude has occurred amongst social workers, lawyers and the staff of detention centres, while police and prosecutors were considered to have changed their thinking the least.63 Overall, three quarters of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believed that the social attitude of all the selected professional categories had changed positively in the last 6 years.

Table 11: Change in Practitioner Perception of change in support for reintegration

Practitioner perception of change in support for reintegration over the last six years among various professional categories

Answer Options Don't know

More opposed

to reintegrat

ion

No chan

ge

Slightly more

supportive of

reintegration

Significantly more

supportive of

reintegration

Response

Count

Police 10% 2% 31% 48% 10% 61

Prosecutor 12% 3% 24% 47% 14% 59

Judge 7% 3% 12% 50% 28% 58

Social worker 3% 2% 12% 34% 51% 59

Lawyer 7% 2% 14% 47% 31% 59

Staff of detention and rehabilitation centers

13% 4% 11% 47% 25% 55

Comment (optional) 7

answered question 74

skipped question 2

Source: UNICEF Practitioner survey Q4

One factor that was found to have improved the understanding of rehabilitation among practitioners was the revision of curriculums of their professional training programmes. Responses to the survey of practitioners carried out for this evaluation suggests that a high proportion of professional training programmes now promote rehabilitation.

Table 12: Training events relevant to juvenile justice

Have you participated, since 2006, in any training programmes relevant to juvenile justice? If so, did these courses promote rehabilitation as the appropriate approach in dealing with juvenile offenders?

Answer Options Response Percent

Response Count

I did not participate in any training programmes 12.2% 9

I participated in training programmes, these did not promote rehabilitation 9.5% 7

I participated in training programmes that slightly promoted rehabilitation 31.1% 23

I participated in training programmes that strongly promoted rehabilitation 47.3% 35

From these trainings, what have you been able to apply in your professional activities? (comment) 32


62 For more information on the online survey see Volume 2, Annex 9 to this report. 63 . The police and prosecutors were the only ones where more than 15% of all respondents perceived no positive change in the use of reintegration.


54

skipped question 2


A change in social attitude amongst professionals is essential if reform is to be effective and on-going, particularly when UNICEF cease to fund the reform. As noted in 3.6.1(a), it was acknowledged by stakeholders that UNICEF played a significant role in influencing a change of social attitudes, which in turn had a significant impact on the reform of juvenile justice and a reduction in custody and an increase in the use of diversion.

a) Legislation and policy

In a clear majority of the countries covered by this evaluation, there were improvements in the legislative and regulatory framework of the juvenile justice system between 2006 and 2012. This was largely due to amendments and improvements to existing legislation, making them more compliant with international standards related to juvenile justice.

In most countries and territories, there are now national legal instruments in place for prosecutors to have the legal power to divert. In most countries and territories, there is primary and secondary legislation, policies and plans that define community based services and guidance for professionals. Most stakeholders however, acknowledged that there were still weaknesses in implementation.

In Georgia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan there was a considerable improvement in the juvenile justice legislation, while in Albania, Armenia and Azerbaijan there was only modest or little improvement.

In Armenia, along with a number of development partners and civil society organisations,

UNICEF has advocated new legislation concerning children in the justice system. This was not

achieved during the period of this evaluation.64 However, there was de facto cooperation

between police, local authorities and NGOs with respect to the Child Justice Centres (CJCs - pilot

diversion projects). Towards the end of 2011, specialised juvenile justice judges were appointed

in each court.65

In Azerbaijan, during the period under evaluation, there were no major legislative reforms

directly affecting juvenile justice; a new law on juvenile justice has been in preparation for most

of the period under examination, and UNICEF staff do not expect that it will be adopted in the

near future.66 However, there were numerous smaller legislative and regulatory improvements

relevant to juvenile justice and child protection.67 Child-friendly Police Guidelines were

reviewed, adopted and the final version was officially submitted to the Ministry of Internal

Affairs for review and adoption.

In Ukraine, until 2012 national legislation did not limit the length of pre-trial detention for

juveniles. In 2012 the new Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine limited the duration of detention

to 60 days. In practice, this duration was very rarely exceeded even before 2012.

64 The UNICEF office in Armenia believes that there are now signs of progress towards a specialised juvenile justice system. “There is a call for having a more comprehensive system… what is happening now is that also with of our support there is an agenda of legal reforms… The criminal procedure code being voted on.” (Interview with UNICEF CO Armenia, 31.05.14.) 65 Based on Decision N16L of the Council of the Courts’ Presidents adopted on 26 August 2011. 66 In 2009 a first Draft of the Law on juvenile justice developed and presented during the International Conference on Justice for Children in Baku (Judicial Legal Counsel, Justice Academy, UNICEF, and OSCE). In 2010 the draft law on juvenile justice was further improved and recommendations on legal and institutional frameworks developed (Parliament, UNICEF, and Azerbaijani Lawyers Confederation). In 2012 the draft law on juvenile justice was officially submitted to the Parliament for consideration and high as well as technical meeting were conducted in order to finalise the process. 67 Including the Cabinet Decision No 180 of 19 November 2009, on the approval of “Rules of placement and keeping of children in shelters who have fallen victims of human trafficking”, Presidential Decree No 5 of 13 January 2010, on the establishment of specialized Department on De-Institutionalization and Child Protection under the Ministry of Education, and a Presidential Decree on the approval of “State Program on De-Institutionalization and Alternative care (2006-2015).


55

In Kazakhstan, two presidential decrees resulted in the setting up of the Minor’s Court and

the appointment of specialist juvenile judges68

Across the region, more than 90% of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believed that legislation

and policy in their country has improved in the last six years, as is shown in the following table.

Table 13: Legislation and Policy Change Regarding Young Offenders

Practitioner perception of changes in legislation and policy regarding young offenders in the last six years

Answer Options Response Percent Response Count

Much worse 0.0% 0 Somewhat worse 0.0% 0

Same 6.8% 5

Somewhat better 54.1% 40 Much better 36.5% 27 Don't know/no opinion 2.7% 2


skipped question 2


Even where an adequate legislative and regulatory framework is in place, implementation often falls short.

Many stakeholders noted for example that, while their national legislation gives children the right to legal

council from the moment of arrest, in practice the law is circumvented, with police claiming that they have

not detained suspects but are merely holding ‘conversations.’

UNICEF has been the main body influencing legal reform, and where there has been success in this

determinant, it has contributed significantly to reform of the juvenile justice system.

b) Budget/Expenditure

Budgets and expenditures can show the extent to which children are considered a priority and, within this,

what level of expenditure is allocated to juvenile justice. For UNICEF, an “adapted budget” that demonstrates

political will is one that allocates funds to prevention, diversion support and implementation and promotion

of alternatives to detention. This evaluation tried to verify the existence of dedicated juvenile justice budget

lines within the ministries concerned such as education, health and social welfare, and the existence of a

mechanism for delegating government services, such as reintegration, to NGOs, and effective payment or co-

payment by the ministries concerned.

In most countries and territories, there is modest evidence of changes in budget and expenditure

framework. In general, however, there are no dedicated juvenile justice budget lines within concerned

ministries, and no explicit link to action plans or policy implementation requirements. Nevertheless, there

is evidence of government’s gradual increase in funding for juvenile justice activities, including in taking

over responsibility for pilot projects (see section 3.12.8 below: modelling/piloting) and in some cases their

expansion or generalisation. In a few countries and territories, modalities and channels of finance for

delegating government services to NGOs have been developed.

68 Presidential Decree on the Establishment of Specialised Inter-District Children’s Courts, 23 August 2007 and ‘Approval of the Juvenile Justice System

Development Concept in the Republic of Kazakhstan for 2009-2011’ Order No 625 and Order No. 646, respectively


56

These findings should be understood in a context of stagnation or decline in the (often already low) budget allocations for education and even more so for other child-related state competencies, in several of the countries and territories examined.

Comments from the recent Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of implementation of international human rights

obligations in most of the countries and territories noted a general weakness in child-specific budget

provisions, although no specific references to juvenile justice were made in this context.69

Over 45% of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believe that budgets relevant to juvenile justice have

increased in the last 6 years, with 31.1% believing that there is no change, and only 2.7% believing that the

financial resources allocated to juvenile justice have declined. These perceptions are presented in the

following table.

Table 14: Juvenile Justice Budgets

Practitioner perception of change in Juvenile Justice budgets over the last six years


Much worse 0.0% 0 Somewhat worse 2.7% 2

Same 31.1% 23



skipped question 2


In the western Balkans, the prospect of EU accession provided a framework conducive to increased

budget commitments to a range of policy areas including juvenile justice. Nevertheless, measurable

commitments in Albania and in Kosovo (UNSCR 1244) are modest.

In Albania, a few stakeholders, including the Ministry of Justice, reported a fluctuating attitude by

the Government towards prioritizing and funding juvenile justice. During the main drive of the EU

accession process, in 2006-2007, progress was made and state budget was made available for the

juvenile justice reform, but cuts in the state budget from 2008 on affected juvenile justice and no

clear improvements have been visible since.

In Georgia, during the period under evaluation, there was stakeholder consensus that juvenile justice

funding has increased for the Police, MoJ – Crime Prevention Centre, Detention Centres for Juveniles;

Prosecutors Office, and Ministry of Corrections (National Probation Agency). For example, diversion

was first piloted with development partner support, and has now been fully replicated nation-wide

and covered from state budget. The state has gradually taken financial responsibility for social

workers under the Ministry of Corrections/ National Probation Agency; work on Prevention and

Mediation by CPC of the MoJ, etc. The Ministries of Education and Science, Ministry of Labour, Health

and Social Affairs, Ministry of Sport and Youths are involved in the juvenile justice reform and dealing

69 See for example UPR for Albania (2012), Azerbaijan (2012), Georgia (2008), Kazakhstan (2007), Montenegro (2010), Moldova (2009), Tajikistan (2010) and Ukraine (2011).


57

with children in conflict with the law in the different phases of the proceedings (investigation, before,

during and after the trial). None have a specific budget line in the State Budget dedicated to the

juvenile justice reform.

In all the countries for which data is available, was no significant increase in state financial support to, or

contracting of service delivery from, NGOs, which continue to be dependent on foreign development

partners and private funds. There are however encouraging signs of improved state-NGO cooperation in

juvenile justice issues in the years after the period covered by this evaluation in Albania,70 Georgia71 and

Ukraine.72

c) Management/Coordination

UNICEF advocates for operational coordination mechanisms to manage and coordinate juvenile justice

policies and service delivery, with clearly defined accountabilities and involving all relevant stakeholders such

as the Ministries of Interior, Justice and Social Affairs, the Prosecutor’s Office and NGOs. These coordination

mechanisms should exist all the way down to local levels and have clear definitions of roles and

responsibilities as well as transparent governance mechanisms.

Only some of the countries and territories covered by this evaluation had coordination mechanisms in

place. In most countries and territories, in the period 2006-2012, there was little or no positive change in

management and coordination within government entities on juvenile justice, or consolidation and

expansion of national and sub-national multi-stakeholder coordination mechanisms.

Key findings by country are as follows:

In Albania a certain amount of coordination is facilitated through ODA/OA coordination structures,

particularly the Juvenile Justice Subcommittee of the Committee on Law Reform of the International

Consortium of donors (established in 2006), the Steering Committee of the UNICEF-EC-SIDA project

(2006-2009), and the Working Group on juveniles co-chaired by UNICEF and Ministry of Justice and

Supported by EURALIUS (started in 2011).73 However in December 2012, the UN Committee

reviewing Albania’s periodic report on the CRC “reiterates its concern74 about the multitude of actors

involved in the implementation of the Convention at the national and local levels and the limited

70 For example, in Albania, UNICEF has initiated discussions within and the Tirana Municipality for the preparation of guidelines, including budget estimates, for the outsourcing of services to NGOs, through competitive selection processes. (Interviews with the Ministry of Social Welfare and Youth, formerly the Ministry of Labour, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities, and with the Municipality of Tirana). 71In Georgia, the Ministry of Labour and Social protection has worked with UNICEF to select 30 NGOs to undertake future work with children. “The NGOs are delivering the services and we support them financially. We want to have a competitive structure within the NGOs. This is a pilot of this and we are going to expand our practices for the next year – especially the legal clinic… UNICEF helped us to customize the priorities into a more conceptual manner and justify why the priority was important for us because in the past the priorities were funded by UNICEF.” ( Chief of the Department of Social Protection, Ministry of Labour and Social Protection) 7272 In Ukraine, there is no mechanism for delegation government services to NGOs. UNICEF has performed a number of activities (consultation, round-table and expert evaluation) focused on the establishment of a ‘free social market’ (more open competition) for delegation government service to NGOs. See for example the Letter of Intent between UNICEF and the Ministry for Social Affairs, Country Programme Action Plan between the Government of Ukraine and UNICEF for 2012 -2016. 73 Juvenile Justice Subcommittee of the Committee on Law Reform of the International Consortium of donors (established in 2006). Members include UNICEF, EC, the Council of Europe, the World Bank, OSCE, Sida, the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, the Ministry of Interior, the Ministry of Justice, the Office of the General Prosecutor, the General Directorate of Prisons, the School of Magistrates and the Police Academy, as well as the Albanian Helsinki Committee, the Citizen’s Advocacy Office, Save the Children, the Chid Rights Committee of Albania, the Foundation for Conflict Resolution and the Legal Clinic for Minors. The Subcommittee has been a valuable forum for advocacy. Steering Committee of the UNICEF-EC-SIDA project (2006-2009) including: EC, Sida and UNICEF, the Ministry of Justice, the State Social Service, the Ministry of European Integration, the School of Magistrates, the Prison Department and NGOs (Albanian Foundation for Conflict Resolution, Albanian Helsinki Committee, Centre of Integrated Legal Services and Practices, Children’s Human Rights Centre of Albania, and Citizen’s Advocacy Office). 74 CRC/C/15/Add.249 para. 8, 2005


58

capacity of the State Agency for the Protection of Children’s Rights to effectively ensure coordination

among those multiple bodies.”75

In Armenia, the establishment of diversion and social work pilot projects contributed to a gradual

expansion and consolidation of cooperation between police, schools and local government.76

Government officials also attended meetings of the NGO Child Protection Network. Overall,

however, coordination was weak. One study in 2010 found that “According to one governmental

official, ‘each sector works separately... there is no team work.’77

There was some evidence of coordination mechanisms having been established in Azerbaijan,

Georgia, Kyrgyzstan and Montenegro.

In Azerbaijan, the establishment of a juvenile justice taskforce led to improvements in cross-

government and multi-sectoral cooperation.

In Georgia, a coordination mechanism has been in place at national level since December 2008: the

Criminal Justice Reform Inter-Agency Coordination Council established a Juvenile Justice Working

Group to prepare a national strategy and action plan. 78

In Montenegro, the relatively successful reforms started with the creation of a high-level inter-sector

mechanism, the Juvenile Justice Commission. This played a very important role in the initial stage of

the reform

Despite the limited evidence of improvement in operational coordination mechanisms, practitioners remain optimistic. For example, more than three quarters of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believe that operational coordination mechanisms relevant to juvenile justice have improved in the last 6 years, while only two of the 74 respondents believe that such coordination had declined over the same period. These findings are summarised in the following table.

Table 15: Change in operational coordination mechanisms

Practitioner perception of change in operational coordination mechanisms for Juvenile Justice over the last six years


Much worse 1.4% 1 Somewhat worse 1.4% 1 Same 16.2% 12 Somewhat better 56.8% 42 Much better 20.3% 15 Don't know/no opinion 4.1% 3


skipped question 2


75 CRC “Concluding observations the combined second to fourth periodic reports of Albania, adopted by the Committee at its sixty first session (17 September–5 October 2012)”, December 2012, pg.2-5 76 Most of these later closed. 77 O’Donnell (2010) Assessment of Juvenile Justice Reform Achievements in Armenia, UNICEF Regional Office for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia 78 UNICEF (2010) Assessment of Juvenile Justice in Georgia

5.6.2. Supply


59

d) Access to adequately staffed services, facilities and information

UNICEF advocates for a child protection system that provides access to adequate staff services, facilities and

information for children in conflict with the law at all stages of the juvenile justice process, particularly

ensuring the involvement of social services, health, education and civil society players. There should be a

wide range of relevant alternatives to detention for use by children in conflict with the law. In addition,

professionals dealing with children in conflict with the law should have adequate and specialist training to

address children’s rights and needs, including the police, prosecutors, judges, social workers, probation

officers, lawyers, psychologists and other service providers. Children should be seen by professionals able to

assess their needs adequately with the aid of services appropriately tailored to meeting them. Social services

should help the child reintegrate and assume a constructive role in society.

In all countries and territories covered by this evaluation, there is evidence of improvement in availability

and accessibility of services, facilities and information for children in conflict with the law. A greater

proportion of professionals dealing with children in conflict with the law (police, staff of juvenile detention

centres and prosecutors), receive adequate specialised training, particularly to deal with vulnerable

children; in many countries and territories this training has been embedded in the state training institutes

for juvenile justice practitioners. There has been an expansion of relevant alternatives to detention for use

by children in conflict with the law, though the range of alternatives is still limited in most countries and

territories. Social services, health, education and civil society partners are more involved at key stages of

the juvenile justice process in all countries and territories.

This generally positive finding is tempered by evidence of fluctuations in service provision, changes in

policy and reorganisation of the civil service and of funding systems following political developments in

several countries. In this sense, improved access to adequate staff services, facilities and information

should not be considered as definitive, but rather as fragile and potentially reversible.

The EIDHR project provided significant support to activities related to this determinant, both at the country

level, and, to a much greater extent, through support to international knowledge exchange, research and

monitoring activities related to this determinant. Achievements that are particularly noteworthy include:

the expansion to 11 Community Justice Centres in Armenia, from 6 in 2010,

The scaling up of two additional community-based diversion and probation schemes, and opening of a victim-offender mediation centre in Kazakhstan,

The introduction of probation and consolidation of mediation and handover of three diversion centres to municipal governments in Kyrgyzstan, and

Agreement by the Government of Azerbaijan to take over the expenses and responsibility for the diversion centre in Baku and agreement to establish seven similar centres in the country.

Ninety percent of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believe that staff services, facilities and information relevant to juvenile justice have improved over the last 6 years, as the following table shows.

Table 16: Change in staff services relevant to juvenile justice

Practitioner perception of change in staff services relevant to juvenile justice over the last 6 years


Much worse 1.3% 1 Somewhat worse 0.0% 0 Same 13.3% 10


60


answered question 75 skipped question 1


UNICEF has had a very considerable impact on the provision, supply and quality of services and the training

of staff. Indeed, this is perhaps its most significant impact under the various programmes and projects

together with its impact on social norms. There are however still severe limitations to the provision of

services.

Albania: in December 2012 the UN Human Rights Committee stated that “while welcoming that some

training on child rights is provided to medical staff and teachers, the Committee regrets that such

training does not reach all professionals working with or for children.”79

Georgia: UNICEF has successfully supported the integration of the theme of justice for children into

training programmes for prosecutors, judges and lawyers within the relevant national training

institutes. In addition, UNICEF initiated work on the development of a national curriculum on justice

for children (at B.A. and M.A. levels) in collaboration with the eight national universities and the

Ministry of Education and Science.80 Nevertheless, interviewed stakeholders identified a need to

implement the existing requirements for detention facility staff to be adequately trained and have a

relevant professional background to work with children in conflict with the law more consistently

and thoroughly. In a number of cases, employees of the Ministry of Interior, who have a traditional

police training that does not include juvenile justice specific issues, have replaced trained juvenile

justice professionals.

Ukraine: The new Criminal Procedure Code introduced specialisation of judges, prosecutors and

police investigators, but this has yet to be fully implemented. There is currently a lack of specialized

training for judges, public prosecutors, advocates, and police responsible for juvenile offending,

inspectors, social workers, penitentiary system workers, program coordinators and managers of

restorative justice, psychologists, psychiatrists, care givers, who directly work with children in conflict

with the law. There were no recognised programmes of training for juvenile justice specialists at

State level at the time of the evaluation. Unlike Georgia, training programmes at university level and

quality standards for existing courses have still to be established. There is also a lack of social

rehabilitation programmes for (ex-) juvenile offenders and specialists, prepared to implement these

programmes. In August 2014, the number of social workers in Ukraine was cut by 12,000.

a) Financial access

UNICEF promotes the development and operation of free legal or paralegal assistance for juveniles. This

should be accessible to all children across the country, particularly certain groups such as ethnic minorities,

lower income families, migrants and children with disabilities. Children should be able to access legal

79 UN CRC, Human Rights Committee - 61th Session, Consideration of reports submitted by States parties under article 44 of the Convention Albania, 5 October 2012 – pg. 21 - 22 80 UNICEF Georgia country office annual report 2012.

5.6.3. Demand


61

assistance and legal aid. Lawyers should be highly educated, knowledgeable of children’s rights, and

sufficiently remunerated and willing to take up children’s cases. Other services, including victim/offender

mediation, should be free of charge as well.

The evaluators focused on the question of legal aid, as this was available for most countries and territories.

Findings regarding financial capacity to access other services, such as victim/offender mediation, are

fragmentary.

In all countries and territories covered by this evaluation, there was some evidence of improvement in

financial access to legal / paralegal assistance. Free legal assistance lawyers are generally in place, though

not always in rural areas. In most countries and territories there are concerns in relation to the training

received by lawyers and paralegals, and their knowledge of child rights. There are also concerns in relation

to the low level of remuneration given to legal aid lawyers and the impact that this has on their level of

experience and competence. Few experienced lawyers take such cases.81 Stakeholders in several countries

and territories expressed concern that the most vulnerable children may not be able to access good enough

legal/paralegal assistance.

UNICEF has had an impact on the ability of children in conflict with the law to access affordable or free legal

advice. Although there was no funding for the provision of free legal advice in the programme, UNICEF’s work

on legislation and policy has resulted in States and NGOs making affordable or free legal assistance and

representation services available. Stakeholders were asked to what extent access to legal advice had

improved in the last 6 years. Just over half of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believe that ability to

access free legal services has improved in the last 6 years.

Table 17: Practitioner perception of change in capacity to access free legal services

Practitioner perception of change in financial capacity to access juvenile justice services in the last 6 years

Answer Options Response Percent

Response Count

Much worse 0,0% 0 Somewhat worse 2,7% 2 Same 31,1% 23 Somewhat better 45,9% 34 Much better 6,8% 5 Don't know/no opinion 13,5% 10



81 These issues will be addressed in more depth in the upcoming UNDP/UNODC global study on legal aid, which UNICEF is contributing to specifically on children’s issues / children’s access to legal aid. 82 Respondents were asked “UNICEF works to ensure that societies have adequate financial capacity to access juvenile justice services: a free legal or paralegal assistance for juveniles should be in place. This should be accessible to all children across the country, particularly certain groups such as ethnic minorities, lower income families, migrants and children with disabilities. Children should be able to access legal assistance and legal aid. Lawyers should be highly educated, knowledgeable of children’s rights, and sufficiently remunerated and willing to take up children’s cases. Other services, including victim/offender mediation, should be free of charge as well.) In this country, how has financial capacity to access juvenile justice services changed in the last 6 years?


62

In Albania, the Code of Criminal Procedure makes the presence of a lawyer obligatory during

proceedings with accused juveniles, and recognises the right to free legal and psychological

assistance “during the entire process.” A 2009 study for UNICEF noted that, “in Tirana, most accused

juveniles use the services of an assigned lawyer.”83 However, since the legal aid fee for representing

juvenile is half of that for representing an accused adult, “there appears to be broad consensus that

appointed attorneys, who have no training in representation of children, provide poor quality

defence to juveniles.”84

In Georgia, the Legal Aid Service was established in 2007. It now has 12 offices across the country.

Any person can request free legal advice, but representation is provided only in criminal cases, and

only to the ‘socially vulnerable’, i.e., the poor. 89 Legal Aid lawyers represented some 11,000 accused

persons in 2008, including an estimated 30 per cent of accused juveniles. Until 2010, all staff

attorneys were trained in representing juveniles but none were assigned exclusively to this area.85

The Legal Aid System has since 2010 developed its capacity and was the first entity to introduce

specialization in the system. In 2012 there were about 10 lawyers specializing in juvenile justice,

assigned to the Service’s major offices.86

Although Ukrainian legislation contained some isolated individual provisions that regulate the

procedure for providing legal aid,87 at the end of 2012 there was very little implementation of these

provisions and few experienced lawyers offering legal aid services. Nevertheless, some stakeholders

were optimistic that the creation in 2012 of the Coordinating Centre for Legal Aid Provision88 will

gradually improve this situation.

b) Social and Cultural Practices and Beliefs

Practitioners in the field of juvenile justice were asked a question on ‘enabling social and cultural practices’

as part of the survey undertaken for this evaluation. They were asked to indicate the strength of UNICEF’s

role in the following issues: children and their families should be aware of the risks and dangers of certain

activities such as child labour, not going to school, or using illegal substances; and it needs to be ensured that

children are aware of their rights, and that children and families can make positive choices to refrain from

activities which could lead them into conflict with the law

Because of difficulties with data collection and the management of the evaluation, this evaluation

established only a few and fragmentary findings regarding enabling social and cultural practice, and the

evaluators are not able to assess the cross-country trend.

However, more than 80% of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believe that there has been an improvement in the social and cultural practices of children and their families during the period covered by this evaluation, despite UPR comments for a majority of the countries and territories covered by this evaluation, which expressed concern about traditional and cultural attitudes limiting space for child participation or limiting respect for the views of the child.89

The opinions of practitioners are presented in the following table.

83 Assessment of Juvenile Justice Reform Achievements in Albania, UNICEF CEE/CIS, July 2009, pg.22 84 Assessment of Juvenile Justice Reform Achievements in Albania, UNICEF CEE/CIS, July 2009, pg.22 85 UNICEF, Assessment of juvenile justice reform achievements in Georgia 2010 86 At the end of 2014 there were approximately 35 such specialised lawyers throughout the country. 87 The access to free legal aid was regulated by the Presidential Decree No. 509 on the Concept of Reforming the System of Free Legal Aid in Ukraine (2006) 88 . 89 See for example UPR reports for Albania (2012 para 33), Azerbaijan (2012 para 36), Georgia (2008 para 25), Kazakhstan (2007 para 30), Montenegro (2010 para 30), Moldova (2009 para 31), Tajikistan (2010 para 31) and Ukraine (2011 para 33).


63

Table 18: Change in social and cultural practices

Practitioner assessment of change in social and cultural practices of children and their families





c) Timing and Continuity of Use

The justice system should have appropriate social and support services, including services in the community

and after-care services that support the reintegration of children into society, cooperating with the justice

system as required. The juvenile justice system should be aware of the number and proportion of children

who are recidivists and have strategies in place to counter this.

In most countries and territories, there is little or no evidence of changes in continued use of services.

There has been little change in the availability of after-care services to support reintegration of children

who have been in conflict with the law; and there is inadequate data on recidivist children and the

elaboration of strategies to address this issue.

Nevertheless, practitioners seem rather optimistic. For example, seventy-two percent of practitioners

surveyed for this evaluation believe that the ability to make use of juvenile justice services has improved over

the last six years, as the following table shows.

In Armenia, “No state-funded programmes or facilities for the physical and psychological recovery

and social reintegration of juveniles exist, with most such services provided by non-governmental

organizations. Further, there is lack of specifically trained social workers and psychologists to provide

these services.” 90 Although the police could refer juveniles to rehabilitation centres run by NGOs,

there was no formal follow-up mechanism in place.

In Kosovo (UNSCR 1244), measures to develop a rehabilitation system “fall far short of a

comprehensive institution-based approach to the prevention of reoffending.”91

There were significant reforms in Georgia during the period covered by this evaluation. Until 2010,

Georgia has no established system for the referral of released prisoners and detainees to

programmes providing assistance for their reintegration into the community. Since 2011, the country

has a functioning probation system which provides supervision and support to early

released/paroled juveniles. Crime Prevention Centres of the Ministry of Justice also provide some

support to juveniles released from the penitentiary system.

90 UNICEF Armenia Sitan 2012 91 UNICEF, Assessment of juvenile justice reform achievement in Kosovo (UNSCR 1244), 2010, p. 33-34.


64

There was no evidence of any country compiling data on recidivism rates or on the successful, or otherwise,

reintegration of children into society.

UNICEF works to ensure that juvenile justice practices comply with international standards and that

supporting data is being collected routinely and reliably by an appropriate data collection body. In turn, there

should be an independent monitoring mechanism overseeing compliance with standards and promoting and

protecting children’s rights.

In most countries and territories covered by this evaluation there are significant gaps in data collection,

and only a partial disaggregation of data on juvenile justice indicators is possible. In some countries and

territories, there are inconsistencies in the data produced. There is some evidence of progress towards

collection and analysis of disaggregated data on child rights, for example in Ukraine, Albania and

Azerbaijan.92 In Georgia and Montenegro, progress is uneven.

UNICEF supported the collection of data on juvenile justice, in the framework of the TransMONEE project,

which seeks to strengthen the capacity of national statistical offices.

UNICEF offices in all eight countries covered by the EIDHR project identified a series of improvements in the

treatment of complaints of ill treatment of children in police or detention facilities as indicators for the EIDHR

project. The main activity to achieve this was a participatory research project with Ombudsman offices and

NGOs.93 The research process contributed to strengthening the capacity of human rights NGO and

ombudsman offices in monitoring torture and ill-treatment of children. The research had three main

components: surveys of the experiences of children; the effectiveness of mechanisms for the investigation

of torture and ill-treatment, and the impact of torture and ill-treatment on victims. Eight national reports

were prepared and launched, in some cases with significant media and stakeholder interest. The research

process has triggered a series of in-depth reforms in several countries, including Ukraine, Georgia,

Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan and Azerbaijan. No progress was observed in Armenia, where

there were officially no such complaints during the period of implementation of the EIDHR project, and no

official data about the treatment of any outstanding complaints.

UNICEF has had some success in identifying political opportunities to maximise the constituency in favour of

reforms aimed at consolidating and enshrining guarantees of adherence to required quality of service. In all

countries covered by the regional EIDHR project, UNICEF worked with penitentiary authorities and NGOs to

improve the human rights monitoring in places of detention.

In September 2012, towards the end of the period under evaluation, UNICEF Georgia was able to use

reports of torture and ill-treatment in penitentiary establishments, including in facilities housing

92 See for example UPR reports for Albania (2012), Azerbaijan (2012), Georgia (2008), Kazakhstan (2007), Montenegro (2010) Moldova (2009), Tajikistan (2010) and Ukraine (2011). 93 Activity 7 of project EIDHR/2010/252-238

5.6.4. Quality


65

juveniles, to leverage broader support for reform. According to one report, “UNICEF has coordinated

with government officials and NGO representatives and has used the crises in the penitentiary

system as an opportunity to advocate for the creation of a sustainable and effective rights monitoring

mechanism.”94

In Azerbaijan, the establishment by the Commissioner for Human Rights (Ombudsman) of a Child

Rights Unit has had a positive impact on detention conditions. UNICEF closely supported the

Ombudsman Office, with training and with technical assistance to the State Committee on Family,

Women and Children Affairs and the Ombudsman office. According to the Country Office, “before

UNICEF these two organizations didn’t see their role as including a juvenile justice component.” The

Ombudsman valued the help of UNICEF in carrying out research, provision of technical expertise,

showing them how to monitor and evaluate, awareness raising activities, legislation, analysis of

legislation and lobbying.95

In Armenia, sources interviewed for one recent study reported that the establishment and the

activities of the existing independent monitoring groups have made a significant contribution to

improving the treatment of prisoners and detainees. A Human Rights Defender was established in

2003. A study in 2010 reported that it had received few complaints of violations of the rights of

children.96 In 2011 a child rights focal point was established within the institution.

In Kazakhstan, there were no significant improvements in the period 2006-2012, but efforts during

this period did contribute to significant improvements in the monitoring mechanism in 2013, after

the end of the period covered by this evaluation. A law on National Preventive Mechanism under

OPCAT was adopted in July 2013 establishing an “Ombudsman +” model of National Preventive

Mechanism by which the Ombudsman delegated the function of independent monitoring of closed

facilities to civil society organisations. Corresponding amendments were introduced to the Law of

the Republic of Kazakhstan on “On the rights of the child in the Republic of Kazakhstan” and “On

prevention of juvenile delinquency, child neglect and homelessness”. With the adoption of the Law

on National Preventive Mechanism, the children’s colony, the centres for adaptation of children and

special schools are all subject to mandatory monitoring. UNICEF supported the development of the

Draft Law, and supported the Ombudsman to develop a manual on how to monitor children’s

institutions, to train state bodies and NGOs on independent monitoring of children’s institutions and

provided recommendations on potential NGO’s with child rights experience who could potentially

become members of the national preventive mechanism.

Practitioners surveyed for this evaluation had a generally positive assessment of change in the determinant

‘adherence to required quality of services’ in the period 2006-2012. More than 70% of respondents stated

that adherence to the required quality of service had improved over the last six years. The survey responses

are presented in the following table.

Table 19: Practitioner perception of change in adherence to required quality of services

Practitioner perception of change in adherence to required quality of juvenile justice services over the last six years

94 UNICEF Georgia country report 2012 95 Chief of Staff and his team, Human Rights Commissioner (Ombudsman) office 96 O’Donnell (2010) Assessment of Juvenile Justice Reform Achievements in Armenia, UNICEF Regional Office for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia


66





To the extent that the impact of determinants could be evaluated, there was considerable variety between

the countries and territories analysed for this evaluation. However, overall it would seem that:

Reduction in the rate and length of juvenile detention is closely related to changes in social norms

and access to services such as the existence of trained juvenile justice practitioners, particularly

judges, prosecutors and police, in a context of practitioner awareness of, and support for, juvenile

justice reform.

Increased rates of diversion are closely related to access to available and adequately staffed

services. The development of diversion appears to be particularly dependent upon the

establishment of initial pilot diversion programmes and the existence of informed and trained

juvenile justice practitioners, particularly social workers, police and prosecutors. These could

possibly be considered as catalysts and preconditions for wider reform.

Decrease in the length of pre-sentence detention is closely related to legislation/policy, to reforms

in criminal procedure and case management and to the availability of community based services.

Other determinants have their own importance as pre-conditions or complements to the above. For example,

countries and territories where legal reform was achieved during the period under examination generally

had established pilot diversion services, expanded and improved the training of practitioners, and begun to

consolidate some form of cross-government and multi-stakeholder coordination and dialogue. In some other

countries and territories, where these constituents were not in place, activities to promote legislative and

regulatory reform had little or no impact during the period in question.

In some cases legislative reform was necessary in order to establish pilot diversion projects. In others,

diversion piloting emerged through informal cooperation, and was tolerated rather than expressly provided

for in the law.

Existence of operational coordination mechanisms across government and with non-state actors would seem

useful though not essential in the early phases of juvenile justice reform, but would seem essential for its

consolidation. The more successful reforms are often in countries and territories where UNICEF and the

Ministry of Justice have a leading role in operational coordination mechanisms, such as co-chairing working

groups and forums, and where legal reform is discussed and followed by these forums rather than only

through the direct contacts between UNICEF and the relevant Ministries.

Changes in social attitudes towards children in conflict with the law are clearly important, and not only in

those countries and territories which enjoy parliamentary democracy. However, changing social norms (in

5.7. Determinants and the theory of change


67

the sense of attitudes of practitioners) would seem to have a greater direct impact on the diversion

component of juvenile justice reform than enabling social and cultural practices (in the sense of changes in

the thinking of parents and children), at least in the countries and territories examined for this study.97

Although juvenile justice reform requires a number of years, and involves change in a range of determinants,

in some cases identifiable changes in the three results selected for this evaluation can be associated with

specific system changes.

Albania: all interviewed stakeholders agreed that the expansion of the use of diversion measures

and alternatives to imprisonment increased significantly after a package of laws were adopted

followed by the official establishment of the Probation Service in 2009.

A number of findings were made in relation to the Theory of Change, which may lead UNICEF to consider

making some changes to the TOC in order to reflect UNICEF’s contribution to juvenile justice reform in the

CIS/CEE region better.

At the level of results, Deprivation of liberty (Result 1) and Diversion (Result 2), the two results where there

was consistent impact can be associated with changes in multiple determinants, whereas pre-sentence

detention (Result 3), where there was significant impact only in a few countries, is associated with only a few

determinants. This would seem logical, insofar as this result was less consistently targeted than the other

two. At the level of UNICEF (or other development partner) intervention, there is still potential for a more

sustained intervention addressing multiple determinants to achieve impact on the length of pre-sentence

detention (Result 3). Our findings do not suggest that the strategy adopted has failed, but rather that the

breadth, intensity and duration of the UNICEF engagement regarding this specific result has not yet brought

the desired results.

At the level of determinants, our findings do not suggest that the most desirable or ‘normal’ strategy would

take the form of a comprehensive or necessarily balanced attention to the ten determinants. Rather, there

are groups of determinants which are more likely to have a catalyst or leverage effect at different stages of

the reform process. In countries and territories where impact was achieved, the most important bottlenecks

tackled during the early stages which lead to results included:

Adequate legislation and policy in place

Access to adequate staffed services, facilities and information

Conducive social norms

These determinants could be considered as necessary and sufficient to achieve a significant impact in the

result areas identified for this evaluation.

The determinants Adapted budgets and Adherence to required quality of services seem less significant than

originally anticipated. External resources (including from UNICEF and the EU) generally can be mobilised on

an ad hoc basis to address the three core determinants identified above. National government financial

97 It should be remembered that this evaluation solicited the opinions of practitioners much more than those of parents and children.

5.7.1. Impact depends on multiple results

5.7.2. A sub-group of determinants are strongly associated with the results

5.7.3. Some determinants become increasingly relevant in later stages of juvenile justice reform


68

commitment to juvenile justice reforms came only gradually in many of the countries and territories covered

by this evaluation. Similarly, the quality of services was addressed gradually, once reforms were underway.

In this sense, these determinants would seem to be necessary for the consolidation and sustainability of

juvenile justice reform, but without a strong catalytic or multiplier effect.

Five determinants appear to have had only indirect or minor impact on the three results selected for this

evaluation, in the eleven countries and territories examined. These determinants were generally not

addressed in the early stages of successful reforms, are generally not perceived as contributing directly to

progress on other determinants, and are not consistently linked directly to the three results. This group of

‘other’ determinants includes

Operational coordination mechanisms;

Availability of essential commodities;98

Financial capacity to access the services;

Enabling social and cultural practices;

Continued ability to make timely use of the services.

These determinants could be considered neither necessary nor sufficient for juvenile justice reform, despite

their likely impact on quality and sustainability of achieved reforms.

Three of UNICEF’s seven core roles are consistently associated with a reduction in the above mentioned

bottlenecks, particularly those which have a direct and indirect impact on the results.

Enabling knowledge exchange


Modelling/piloting

These could be considered as having the greatest strategic importance, particularly at the start of reform

processes, and where resources are particularly limited.

The remaining four UNICEF core roles are less consistently associated with a wide range of determinants,

and/or with those determinants that seem to have been most significant in the achievement of results in the

countries and territories examined.

The ‘Voice’ for children and adolescents;99

Leveraging resources from the public and private sectors;

Facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly social norms;

Child Rights monitoring and evaluation.

At the same time, stakeholders not only appreciate many of the specific UNICEF activities associated with

these core roles, but also consistently identify UNICEF as a major or pivotal actor in these areas of work. This

98 The ToR deemed this determinant as inapplicable for this evaluation. It is therefore not discussed in the findings chapter. We include it here to maintain consistency with the ToC structure and terminology adopted across UNICEF’s child protection work. 99 Very few stakeholders identified this core role as one where UNICEF made a significant contribution. However the evaluators noted that while some stakeholders and UNICEF staff understand being ‘the voice’ as advocacy on behalf of children, other stakeholders and UNICEF staff understand ‘the voice’ as promoting children’s own voices so they can be heard.

5.7.4. Some determinants have a limited or indirect impact on the results

5.7.5. Some core roles make a minor or indirect contribution to the determinants


69

suggests that these core roles remain important, but that their significance is more complementary and

indirect.

The titles and definitions of some of the core roles and determinants are not well understood.

The vernacular understanding of what UNICEF calls ‘conducive social norms’ and ‘enabling social and

cultural practices’ are rather close.

Similarly, the UNICEF core role ‘voice for children’ is subject to a wide range of interpretations,

including among UNICEF staff.

The UNICEF core role ‘facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly social norms’ as currently

defined would not include UNICEF activities to promote the determinant ‘operational coordination

mechanisms’.

The definition of the determinant ‘Access to adequate staff services, facilities and information’ does

not in fact relate to access as such, but rather to availability.

The definition of the determinant ‘Financial capacity to access the services’ includes the element

‘Lawyers should be highly educated, knowledgeable of children’s rights, and sufficiently remunerated

and willing to take up children’s cases.’ Bar the reference to remuneration, this element would seem

to be closer to the determinant currently named ‘Access to adequate staff services, facilities and

information’, which encompasses the recruitment, training, and motivation of all the other

practitioners involved in the juvenile justice system.

Government political support and active engagement for juvenile justice reform should in most cases not be

presented as preconditions for UNICEF’s engagement in juvenile justice. In reality the evaluation has

demonstrated that political support can be generated during the reform process using a combination of

advocacy and policy advice, technical assistance for capacity development and promotion of conducive social

norms.

The evaluation did not reveal any evidence that a particular determinant was a ‘pre-requisite’ to reform.

Those countries that demonstrated the greatest level of reform had different combinations of determinants.

Similarly, where the impetus for reform weakened, this could be attributed to different determinants in the

different countries and territories. In theoretical terms, therefore, no determinant or combination of

determinants could be clearly identified as both necessary and sufficient (meaning that the change in the

given determinant always leads to the intended effect and is the only way to get there).

Having reached this conclusion, however, it is true to say that in many countries and territories, the existence

of pilot diversion projects seems to have been a catalyst, in terms of consolidating and making visible a

constituency of committed practitioners, and in generating evidence about the success of diversion, which

5.7.6. Some terms and concepts used by UNICEF and related to the Theory of Change are not clear

5.7.7. Only factors that must be in place before UNICEF begins juvenile justice programming should be identified as preconditions in the Theory of Change

5.8. How have the determinants interacted with each other during the reform process (e.g. are some determinants pre-requisites to the presence of others or are some determinants effective only if combined with others)?


70

filters up to decision-makers (eg Tajikistan, where a pilot diversion project led to replication of diversion

across the country, specialist juvenile justice training and programmes for reintegration in the juvenile colony

as well as the development of legal aid). Support at the expert level, among practitioners and in inter-

ministerial and multi-stakeholder forums, is a common feature in the countries and territories where success

has been more rapid and more significant. In theoretical terms, the determinants of social norms (enabling

environment), coordination/management (enabling environment) could be considered as sufficient but not

necessary (the change in the given determinant is one way to achieve the intended result but there are other

ways).

In contrast, lack of adequate services and budget support did not appear to be fundamental obstacles to the

reform process, since development partners and NGOs demonstrated their ability to provide ad hoc or pilot

services during a transitional period, and national governments in several countries and territories have

proved willing to take over, multiply and finance these initiatives after fact-based lobbying from UNICEF and

NGOs (for instance, in Georgia and Azerbaijan).

In some countries and territories, there is evidence that external factors have influenced the numbers of

children in detention and can help to explain changes in the degree of achievement of the three targeted

juvenile justice results.

The most obvious one is the influence of a widespread trend, including in many of the countries and

territories included in this evaluation, towards humanization/de-penalisation of criminal legislation. This

can be seen, for example, in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan.

In Montenegro, the broader legal environment for child protection was considerably strengthened during

the period under evaluation. Milestones included the Family Law (2007), Law on Protection from Family

Violence (2010), Law on Ombudsman (adopted in July 2011) and Act on Treatment of Juveniles in Criminal

Proceedings (2011); the Strategy for implementation of the Law on Protection from Family Violence;

Fostering Strategy; Strategy for permanently resolving the issue of displaced and internally displaced persons

in Montenegro (2011-2015) and the Strategy for improvement of status of Roma and Egyptians in

Montenegro 2012-2016. All of these have had an impact on the juvenile justice ‘climate’, social norms and

the treatment of children in conflict with the law.

There have also been amnesties in several countries and territories such as in Albania and Kyrgyzstan.

The general trend of gradual humanisation and de-penalisation of criminal legislation and judicial procedures

does not preclude contrary short-term trends in selected countries. These were identified in several countries

and territories; recurrent factors include: political decisions to enforce ‘zero tolerance’ policies towards

crime; poorly designed or poorly implemented administrative reform; political instability leading to delay in

decision-making; rapid turnover of decision-making and senior operational positions, for example in Georgia;

as well as economic and financial crises, for example in Albania and (towards the end of the period under

examination) in Tajikistan.

In Georgia, shortly before the period under evaluation, the President announced a ‘zero

tolerance’ policy towards crime. This was initially very positively perceived by practitioners and

5.9. Were there external factors – i.e. not related to the reform process in itself – that have influenced positively or negatively the number of children in detention, the use of diversion and the duration of pre-sentence detention?


71

the public. Between 2005 and 2006 there was a 123% increase in juvenile convictions and a 325%

increase in custodial sentences for juveniles. The conviction rate increased from 68% in 2006 to

74% in 2008. The proportion of convictions for non-property offenses also increased from 28%

in 2005 to 38% in 2007.100

In Ukraine, the consistency of policy and programmes in the interests of children was weakened

by periods of political paralysis and significant administrative reforms of the institutional

mechanism for protection of children’s rights. For example, there was an eleven month gap

between the December 2010 abolition of the Ministry for Family, Youth and Sports, and the

establishment of a new Department for Protection of Children’s Rights and Adoption in the

Ministry of Social Policy. Reform in the Ministry of Internal Affairs caused the liquidation of the

Criminal Police Department for Issues of Minors, and redundancy of many experienced police

officers. Responsibilities previously held by the Department for the Issues of Minors were

transferred to different departments of two weak and hardly connected subdivisions: offence

prevention and criminal investigation.

A further, important external factor applied to Montenegro, Moldova and, to a lesser extent Albania.

Documentary review and interviews consistently suggest that the EU accession process provided both a

widely accepted normative framework and access to resources and peer networks that supported juvenile

justice reform. A similar dynamic within the ENPI-East framework can be observed in Moldova.

In Moldova, the change of government in late 2009 and developments within the EU Association

process led in 2011 to the formulation of the Government Justice Sector Reform Strategy and

Action Plan 2011-2016. This has been associated with a steady decline in detention rates from

2011 onwards.

UNICEF’s country offices have consistently addressed legislation and policy, conducive social norms,

management and coordination, quality of services and access to adequately staffed services. UNICEF

offices in each country and territory covered by this evaluation considered that more than 80% of its

juvenile justice activities addressed these five determinants. The evaluation found that the regional office

focused on a narrower number of determinants: legislation/policy, access to services and conducive social

norms.

There is a significant variety between the relative importance of each determinant in the work of each

country office.101 This is illustrated in the following chart.

100 UNICEF (2010) Assessment of Juvenile Justice in Georgia 101 This is only an approximate indication; evaluators and UNICEF staff in the various countries and territories may have used slightly different criteria in their attribution of activities to each determinant, which was done specifically for this evaluation.

5.10. To what extent has UNICEF been engaged in each of the determinants; were some of the determinants addressed more or less than others and why?


72

Figure 12: Percentage of UNICEF projects associated with each determinant

Source: Data supplied by UNICEF Country Offices

There is relative consistency between stakeholder perception of UNICEFs contributions to each of the

determinants, and the relative importance of this determinant within the country office portfolio of activities.

For example, the consensus from stakeholders’ consultation in Azerbaijan is that UNICEF mostly contributed

to legislation/policy, management/coordination, access to adequately staffed services, continued use of

services, and quality of services according to standards. The first three mentioned determinants were

addressed in 89% of the activities of the country office. In contrast, the country office did not identify any of

its activities as specifically addressing continued use of services and quality of services, while stakeholders

identified these as determinants where UNICEF had made a significant difference.

The ten determinants can also be aggregated into the four elements of level three of UNICEF’s MoRES

framework: enabling environment, supply, demand and quality. The analyses of the proportion of activities

that relate to each element of the MORES framework suggests that country offices are focused on the

enabling environment, and to a lesser extent supply and demand. In contrast, the quality element is a

relatively minor part of the country office portfolio.

The regional office is more focused on enabling environment than any of the country offices, with some focus

on supply, and no significant focus on the demand or quality elements of the MoRES framework. This analysis

is illustrated in the following chart.

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Legislation/policy (enabling environment) Access to adequately staffed services, facilities (supply)

Conducive social norms (enabling environment) Quality of services (quality)

Management/coordination (enabling environment) Availability of essential commodities (supply)

Timing and continuity of use of services (demand) Financial access (demand)

Enabling soc/cultural practices (demand) Adapted budgets, (enabling environment)


73

Figure 13: Proportion of activities addressing each MoRES component


Country office assessment of UNICEF’s contribution to the various determinants is presented in the following

chart. There is a reasonable consistency between the relative importance of each determinant and in the

attention paid to these determinants by the country offices. It is however interesting to note that country

offices perceive a relatively high UNICEF impact on the determinant ‘continued ability to make timely use of

the services’, while identifying very few of their activities as directly addressing this determinant. UNICEF

staff in the region feel that that they had the least impact on financial capacity to access the services, quality

of services and adapted budgets.

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Enabling environment Supply Quality Demand


74

Figure 14: Country Offices’ assessment of UNICEF’s contribution to the system level changes associated

with Juvenile Justice.

The perception of UNICEF juvenile justice staff on budget levels for juvenile justice objectives was generally

positive. However, Country officers expressed some concern that the financial and human resources that

UNICEF had invested and leveraged for reform of juvenile justice did not enable them to respond to all

local needs and opportunities.

Table 20 below provides a summary of the number of juvenile justice related interventions and the overall

financial investment across the various programmes. A total of 210 interventions were identified in the 11

countries including 19 regional initiatives, corresponding to a total budget of $26m US Dollars.102 The table

below sets out the expenditure in each of the countries and territories. In terms of distribution throughout

the period, 33% of activities fall under the period 2010-2013 and 67 during the previous period 2006-2009

Table 20: UNICEF juvenile justice interventions in the 11 CEE/CIS countries – 2006-2012

102 In terms of distribution throughout the period, 33% of activities fall under the period 2010-2013 and 67 during the previous period 2006-2009.

5.11. Were sufficient resources (financial and human) invested in the reform or leveraged to achieve the three selected results?

5.11.1. Adequacy of resources invested/fundraised by UNICEF for Juvenile Justice related work


75

Country N. of interventions Cost USD % Notes

Albania 41 3,000,000 11%

Armenia 20 275,175 1%

Azerbaijan 20 1,361,000 5%

Georgia 19 783,743 3%

Kazakhstan 10 4,078,571 16%

Kosovo (UNSCR

1244) 2 5,007,126 19%

2 programmes of higher

level

Kyrgyzstan 22 285,719 1%

Moldova 4 3,317,670 13%

Montenegro 22 1,875,003 7%

The 22 interventions are

covered by 15

programmes

Tajikistan 20 4,200,000 16% The 20 interventions are

covered by 3 programmes

Ukraine 11 404,583 2%

RO 19 1,716,396 7% The 19 interventions are

covered by 6 programmes

Total 210 26,304,987 100%


76

Figure 15: Distribution of financial resources per determinant

In most countries and territories, during the period examined, the number of project officers varied between

one and two, depending on the availability of project funds (the EU and Netherlands being the main donors).

However, it is relatively common for staff working on juvenile justice to also have other child protection

responsibilities. Half the UNICEF country offices reported that the average seniority of posts responsible for

juvenile justice within the organisation at country level has increased, while slightly more than half report

that the number of staff with juvenile justice responsibilities has increased.103

Over half of UNICEF staff respondents identified staff rotation as having a negative impact on the

implementation of programming in this sector, as this caused a weakness in continuity of juvenile justice

staffing and in handover and induction procedures. 104 One respondent commented that:

103 UNICEF juvenile justice Country Office Survey Q3 104 UNICEF juvenile justice Country Office Survey Q5

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Armenia Azerbaijan Georgia Kazakhstan Moldova Ukraine

% of financial resources per determinant

Legislation/policy (enabling environment) Access to adequately staffed services, facilities (supply)

Conducive social norms (enabling environment) Quality of services (quality)

Management/coordination (enabling environment) Availability of essential commodities (supply)

Timing and continuity of use of services (demand) Financial access (demand)

Enabling soc/cultural practices Adapted budgets

Sources: Data supplied by UNICEF Country Offices

5.12. How efficiently managed and coordinated were the resources (financial and human) inputted into the reform by UNICEF

5.12.1. UNICEF perceptions of the adequacy of staffing and management structure


77

“overall, all juvenile justice staff follow a general UNICEF agenda in juvenile justice. However, from

my experience, every new juvenile justice staff comes with a different view, strategy and/or agenda

for change; after analysing the history of the organization, I have learned that there have been

initiatives (some very good) undertaken by my predecessors which were never finished or followed-

up upon due to lack of introduction/proper handing over to the new juvenile justice staff. This has

seriously affected on-going UNICEF initiatives and / or sent-out messages on juvenile justice

reforms.”105

In response to the Internet-based survey of country officers, staff working on juvenile justice were satisfied

with the support provided to them. However, several stressed the need for more specific juvenile justice

training, and/or for a stronger induction process for staff that is new to the sector. They also considered that

the outputs obtained in were proportionate to the programme duration and financial resources. More than

two thirds of CO staff surveyed considered that the outputs achieved by the country offices were good or

very good, considering the financial resources that the country offices had allocated to them.106 .

As the following table shows, there is slightly more concern about gaps in financial resources than with gaps

in human resources.

Table 21: UNICEF staff perceptions of resources invested/levered

In this country, do you consider that UNICEF has invested/leveraged for reform of Juvenile Justice

Answer Options the human

resources

the financial

resources

Seriously inadequate 0.0% 7.7%

Somewhat inadequate 23.1% 30.8%

Adequate 53.8% 46.2%

High 15.4% 15.4%

Very high 7.7% 0.0%

Source: UNICEF juvenile justice Country Office survey Q10

All country offices reported (in interviews and in an anonymous survey) that regional office guidance and

support has been available when needed. In the survey, half the country office staff considered that the

UNICEF regional office provided “good” support and guidance, with no respondents indicating that they

had received “no” or “insufficient” support and guidance.107 Slightly less than half considered that the

regional office brought a “high” or “very high” value added to the work of the country offices.108 One

respondent suggested that this support had strengthened in recent years.109

105 Interviews reported under I.10.12 106 UNICEF juvenile justice Country Office Survey Q2 107107 UNICEF Country Office juvenile justice Survey Q6: when asked to evaluate “guidance and support from the UNICEF Regional Office for work on Juvenile Justice during the period 2006-2013, 25% of respondents said “adequate”, 50% said “good” and 25% said “very good”. 108 UNICEF Country Office juvenile justice Survey Q9 109 UNICEF Country Office juvenile justice Survey response #3167129016

5.12.2. Regional office guidance and support


78

One juvenile justice specialist commented that “updates through the Regional Knowledge and Leadership

Agenda reference group [internal UNICEF group including CO and RO] are important for the country specific

planning, however, further exchange on new areas of engagement and UNICEF's core roles would be

important for understanding of the broader regional expertise and promising practices. Juvenile justice

webinars at the global level, knowledge of the global initiatives would also enhance the level of staff

capacity.”110

Staff from country offices were invited to assess, on an anonymous basis, the importance of regional office

support in each of their own core roles. A significant contribution was identified for each core role, though

particularly in knowledge exchange and policy advice. These perceptions are presented in the following chart.

Figure 16: UNICEF Country Office staff assessment of impact of Regional Office on Core Roles

Source: UNICEF Country Office juvenile justice Survey Q7

Although the interviewed stakeholders in all countries and territories are generally positive or very positive

in their perceptions of UNICEF, one area where critical comments were identified relates to what some

stakeholders perceive as UNICEF’s slow and bureaucratic processes. For example, one civil society

stakeholder criticized UNICEF work for being “correct but too slow (probably because of the internal

bureaucratic system within UNICEF). For them it is more important to write more reports. While they were

[still] writing a report we submitted the draft law to the government. In countries like …, UNICEF offices should

be more flexible but they are even slower than our government.”

The evaluation TOR set out 10 roles/ strategies.

Acting as lead UN entity in juvenile justice


110 UNICEF Country Office juvenile justice Survey response #3245367680

Modelling/piloting

Facilitating national dialogue

Voice for children

Monitoring and evaluation

Leveraging resources

Policy advice/technical assistance

Knowledge exchange

Low Medium High Very high

5.13. To what extent were the following UNICEF roles/strategies particularly efficient to achieve the results?


79

Being the ‘voice’ for children and adolescents

Monitoring and evaluation

Leveraging resources from the public and private sectors

Facilitating a national dialogue towards child-friendly social norms

Enabling knowledge exchange

Modelling/piloting

Capacity development

Ensuring proper internal controls and risk management.

As a starting point to determine efficiency, the evaluation attempted to estimate the proportion of the

UNICEF juvenile justice budget and activities allocated to the roles/strategies.

Figure 17: The proportion of UNICEF juvenile justice budget and activities allocated to the

roles/strategies


More than 80% of the activities of each country office are associated with four of the roles/strategies: policy

advice and technical assistance, modelling and piloting, monitoring and evaluation and voice for children and

adolescents.111 While policy advice and technical assistance constituted the most important core role in each

country office, and absorbed 30-80% of activities, there was otherwise a considerable variety in the extent

to which country offices engaged in activities relating to the other six categories. The regional office also

focussed on four of the roles: policy advice and technical assistance, modelling/piloting (meaning funding

and support to country office initiatives for modelling and piloting, since the regional office did not carry out

any direct modelling or piloting), monitoring and evaluation and enabling knowledge exchange. The trends

are illustrated in the Figure 17 above.

Juvenile justice stakeholders in 5 of the fieldwork countries and territories were invited to rate UNICEF’s

impact in relation to the activities set out below. The 10 roles/strategies set out in the TOR were combined

into 7 roles, which correspond to UNICEF’s 7 core roles. A consistently high proportion of stakeholders

111 Country offices provided an analysis of their project portfolio across eleven core roles (rather than compromise the regional theory of change). However, this was largely a matter of terminology and the evaluators have reorganized the analysis into the seven categories specified in the TOR.

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Leveraging resouces from the public and private sectors Facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly social norms

Enabling knowledge exchange The voice for children and adolescents

Monitoring and evaluation Modelling piloting



80

believed that UNICEF had high impact with its policy and technical assistance work, facilitating national

dialogue towards child friendly social norms, and in modelling and piloting. Conversely, very few

stakeholders believed that UNICEF had high impact with its work on ‘children’s voice’ or in leveraging

public and private resources. The results are presented in the following chart.

Figure 18: Stakeholder perceptions of UNICEF impact through its core roles

Field work interviews with 92 respondents in five countries

Interviews in Azerbaijan were not coded in the same way as for the other 5 countries and territories.

However, interviewed stakeholders in Azerbaijan considered that UNICEF had achieved the greatest impact

with its work on facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly social norms, and in monitoring and

evaluation.

Different categories of stakeholders had slightly different perceptions of UNICEF’s impact across the seven

roles. While all categories of stakeholders identified UNICEF’s most effective roles as facilitating national

dialogue towards child friendly social norms as well as policy and technical assistance, donors and

government respondents also identified M&E and knowledge management, while civil society respondents

identified a high UNICEF impact in modelling and voice, and juvenile justice practitioners mentioned

modelling and leveraging of resources. These trends are shown in figure 19 below.

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Voice Leveragingresources

Facilitatingnationaldialogue

M&E Knowledgeexchange

Policy and TA Modelling/Pilots

Georgia Tadjikistan Moldova Albania Ukraine


81

Figure 19: Stakeholder perceptions of UNICEF CO core roles

Note: percentage of respondents identifying a significant UNICEF impact in each core role.

Source: Data from 75 interviews in 5 countries

There were clear differences between the pattern of UNICEF’s allocation of human and financial resources

to the various core roles, and the impact of those roles as perceived by stakeholders. Stakeholders perceived

policy / technical assistance and facilitating a national dialogue toward child friendly social norms as having

similar high impact; while UNICEF Country Offices associate 52.6% of their activities with policy/ technical

assistance and only 2.4% with facilitation of a national dialogue towards child friendly social norms. Outside

Albania, almost no stakeholders considered that UNICEF’s role as ‘voice for children’ had a high impact, while

country offices associated 10.0% of their activities with this core role. This dissonance may not as great as

appears at first sight. It is possible that UNICEF and the stakeholders interpret the meaning of determinants

and core roles differently. For instance, UNICEF regards ‘voice of children’ as relating to advocacy: influencing

policy makers, legislators and practitioners to change the juvenile justice system and its practices.

Stakeholders, however, frequently see this term as relating to ‘participation of children and hearing children’s

voices’. This is likely to have influenced the findings. Equally, when it comes to monitoring and evaluation,

stakeholders rarely have in mind, for instance, the MICS survey, which UNICEF staff would regard as a high

quality and value monitoring and evaluation tool.

Although ‘the voice for children’ and leveraging resources from the public and private sectors received a

lesser ‘impact’ score, stakeholders not only appreciated UNICEF activities associated with this role, but also

consistently identified UNICEF as a major or pivotal actor in these areas of work. This suggests that these

roles remain important, but that their significance is more complementary and indirect.

Montenegro, which gained independence in the first months of the evaluation period, was the only country

in which UNICEF seems to have engaged actively in all seven core roles and the only country in which there

was clear progress in all three results selected for this evaluation.112

112 Contributing factors may include the country’s small size, which facilitates communications and networking between stakeholders and amongst practitioners, as well as the constant pressure of the EU accession process. UNICEF did not experience significant turnover of its juvenile justice staff in Montenegro during the period in question, and this may also have contributed towards the internalization of the ToC approach and to a more comprehensive planning and monitoring of the agency’s engagements in the juvenile justice sector. The human factor may also have been significant.


82

There is, unfortunately, too little data to conclude whether Montenegro’s success in reform was conditional

on the fact that UNICEF engaged actively in all seven core roles.

A consistently high proportion of stakeholders believe UNICEF has high impact with its policy and technical

assistance work, facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly social norms, and in modelling and

piloting. As can be seen from Figure 15 above, the largest proportion of the budgetary spend under the

project was spent on policy advice and technical assistance. This included design of diversion programmes,

law reform, devising and delivering training and monitoring and evaluation. Although not directly surveyed,

the evaluation found that the impact of the policy advice and technical assistance was high, especially in

relation to legal reform which sets the framework for a lasting change in approach to juvenile justice.

Specifics about the EIDHR/UNICEF regional project under activity 2 of that project include:

Technical assistance support was provided for national legislative reform in five countries (Armenia,

Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine);

Progress towards juvenile justice systems’ knowledge and specialization was observed particularly in

Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine;

In all countries, tasks supported under this project are likely to have continuing impact after the end

of the project, reflecting the long timescale for legislative and administrative reform.

This includes advocating and communicating on key national policies, social issues, mind-sets and attitudes.

In many of the countries and territories surveyed, clear, evidence-based advocacy messages have been

developed and articulated by UNICEF staff. Partnerships have been developed and opportunities used with

other stakeholders for joint advocacy/communication; in particular, a range of NGOs have developed

communication work around themes close to UNICEF’s priorities.

In Albania and Ukraine, “Being the voice of Children” was one of the three top Core Roles

mentioned in the interviews as important (mentioned by 50% of respondents). UNICEF was

reported extremely effective in its advocacy role towards Government and in bringing the issue

of juvenile justice to international attention.

In Azerbaijan, many interviewed NGOs believed that UNICEF’s most important role was in

bringing the issue of juvenile justice to the government’s attention. UNICEF Country Office staff

told evaluators that “we generated debate about what they should change in the country, we

brought the reform idea on the agenda and we brought the urgency.” Multiple channels of

advocacy were used, partnerships were developed and opportunities were used with other

stakeholders for joint advocacy/communication platform.

According to UNICEF staff, in Montenegro UNICEF concentrated on this core role, particularly in

2006-2007.

5.13.1. Policy advice and technical assistance

5.13.2. Being the voice for children


83

Across the region, there is relatively little evidence of child and family participation (particularly from

marginalised groups) in identifying and prioritising issues for advocacy and communication. Respondents,

particularly from civil society in Azerbaijan and Georgia, specifically mentioned the absence of such

participation.

Within Activity 4 of the EIDHR / UNICEF project support was given to children’s participation in the delivery

of advocacy messages. In particular, the EIDHR project supported video production workshops in Armenia,

Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Ukraine, for children currently or formerly in conflict with the law,

leading to 90 children each delivering one minute video testimonies. All videos are available on YouTube.

They were shown during national and regional events.

UNICEF has supported a large number of studies analysing the evolution of juvenile justice in all the countries

and territories covered by this evaluation. The regional office commissioned comprehensive juvenile justice

system assessments to be carried out in almost all countries, each using the same methodology. 113

During the period of evaluation two country assessment reports, one on Kyrgyzstan and one on Tajikistan

were supported under the EIDHR/UNICEF joint action (Activity 1). A further synthesis report was prepared

on Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan). Stakeholders in these

countries confirmed that these have rapidly became key reference documents for stakeholders interested in

juvenile justice reform. Since these studies were supported by EU funds, UNICEF was able to allocate its own

resources to other assessments and updates. An adequate fact-based analysis of the state of and tendencies

in juvenile justice was thereby established across the region. The synthesis report on juvenile justice in

Central Asia was launched at the European Parliament on 19 June 2012, with participation of MEPs, EEAS,

DEVCO, UNICEF and Governments of Central Asia.

Most countries and territories surveyed do not have a genuinely government-owned mechanism for

monitoring juvenile justice action plans. UNICEF, and to a lesser extent other actors and NGOs play a key

role in maintaining government attention to the juvenile justice agenda.

The Albanian Ministry of Justice and UNICEF staff reported that there was no monitoring system

for the Actions Plans at all throughout the period.

In Georgia, UNICEF and the available EU project documentation identify ministries and

government agencies as responsible for strategy, action plans, and implementation of specific

activities. In practice, development partners have the leading role in monitoring. The M&E

requirements of the various externally funded projects and programmes constitute the bulk of

UNICEF M&E carried out, with the government not actively involved in this process.

In Ukraine, monitoring and evaluation of the National Plan implementation is undertaken by the

inter-agency Commission on Childhood Protection, chaired by the Minister of Ukraine for Youth

and Sport. Formally, its’ main tasks include addressing issues calling for interagency coordination

and multi-sectoral cooperation. In practice, only issues within the competency of the chairing

ministry are systematically addressed. The Ombudsman’s office has reported that the Action

113 http://www.unicef.org/ceecis/protection_7704.html

5.13.3. Child rights monitoring and evaluation

http://www.unicef.org/ceecis/protection_7704.html


84

plans are in reality monitored by the initiative of NGOs, and not systematically. However, since

2012 a Special Representative on Child Protection, Equality and Non-Discrimination, appointed

by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights (HRO) undertakes an annual monitoring

and evaluation of National Plans implementation, involving NGOs and International agencies.

Thanks in part to financial support from the EIDHR project, in 2012 Ukraine became a member

of European Network of Ombudsman for Children (ENOC).

This evaluation concludes that Activity 7, Research on rehabilitation needs for child victims of torture or ill-

treatment, made a relevant, timely, and effective contribution to this result. The research process

contributed to strengthening the capacity of human rights NGO and ombudsman offices in monitoring

torture and ill-treatment of children. The research had three main components: surveys of the experiences

of children; the effectiveness of mechanisms for the investigation of torture and ill-treatment, and the impact

of torture and ill-treatment on victims. Eight national reports were prepared and launched, in some cases

with significant media and stakeholder interest. The research process has triggered a series of in-depth

reforms in several countries, including Ukraine, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan and

Azerbaijan.

Stakeholders in several countries taking part in the EIDHR project identified the research on torture and ill-

treatment of children in the juvenile justice system conducted by the Ombudsman, NGOs, UNICEF regional

office and country office in 2011 as part of the EIDHR project as particularly effective.

Interestingly, across the region, stakeholders, with the exception of development partners, did not attach a

high importance to this core role of UNICEF.

In Albania, only 25% of respondents identified child rights monitoring and evaluation as an important

role of UNICEF.

In Armenia, One recent study found that most interviewed respondents were “unaware of any

studies on offending by juveniles in Armenia, and many of them agreed that more research is

needed.”114

In Azerbaijan, few stakeholders identified UNICEF support for monitoring and evaluation activities as

having had a significant impact, except for the research on torture and ill-treatment of children

mentioned above.

In Georgia, half of the 18 interviewed stakeholders considered the UNICEF core role in child rights

monitoring and evaluation as the most important and strongest points of intervention in juvenile

justice reform. M&E examples that stakeholders referred to during interviews are related to

assessment of the national juvenile justice system, diversion and juvenile detention.

In Ukraine only 5 of the 18 interviewed stakeholders identified M&E as an important role of UNICEF.

As stated above, however, this may well be due to a different interpretation given to the term ‘monitoring

and evaluation’ by stakeholders than by UNICEF. It is not entirely clear whether stakeholders saw these

reports as ‘monitoring’ or ‘evaluation’.

114 O’Donnell (2010).


85

UNICEF supported national authorities in developing national statistics on juvenile justice, reaching

agreement across government about which statistics to use for policy purposes, and in making fact based

policy decisions. UNICEF’s Transmonee project also facilitated peer exchange and networking across the

region, which promoted knowledge retention in a context of staff turnover in many countries and territories.

Although there was an improvement in the consistency of data collection during the period covered by this

evaluation, all countries and territories still have gaps in the data that, in the opinion of UNICEF, they would

need in order to adequately monitor their juvenile justice systems.

The administrative data used to generate official statistics typically does not include an identification of

ethnic origin; official statistics could not therefore be used to confirm or reject the existence of discrimination

or particular vulnerability on this basis.

In all the countries and territories, UNICEF has a clear understanding of stakeholders in the sector and their

roles. UNICEF has established working relationships with official stakeholders at all levels and with

practitioners and activists in civil society.

Overall, UNICEF has established good working relationships with the main public donors for juvenile justice,

and has been the main conduit of funding for the juvenile justice programme. This role is not particularly

visible to stakeholders, and possibly for this reason, not often perceived as of high importance, even by those

who value the interventions financed by funds leveraged by UNICEF! Just over half of country office staff

surveyed consider that the regional office has had “little” or “some” impact in leveraging resources from the

public and private sectors, with the remainder considering that that this impact has been “high” or “very

high.”115

In Georgia, only 3 out of 18 stakeholders (17%) consider the role of UNICEF in leveraging

resources from public and private sectors as successful. EU will likely be the only significant

funder of juvenile justice reform in the future; however, according to EU representatives, the

funding is more than enough to continue the current reform agenda.

In Montenegro, considerable success was achieved. UNICEF was able to capitalize on the work

done through the SIDA project 2004-2006 (covering both Serbia and Montenegro) and use the

experience and evidence from this project as a strong argument to convince European Agency

for Reconstruction (EAR) and later the European Commission to keep investing in the juvenile

justice reform.

In Ukraine only 4 out of 18 stakeholders consider the role of UNICEF in leveraging resources from

public and private sectors as successful. The NGOs respondents in particular consider that

UNICEF could do better and be more effective in this area.

3.12.6 Facilitating a national dialogue towards child friendly norms

In all 11 countries and territories, UNICEF has advocated for a change away from a judicial, adversarial,

punishment based, criminal justice system for children, to one that complies with the requirements of the

115 UNICEF Country Office juvenile justice Survey Q7.2

5.13.4. Leveraging resources from the public and private sector


86

CRC, based on a non-judicial, re-integrative model designed specifically to meet the need of children. The

nature of the activities on social norms contained in the programmes of in each of the 11 countries is set out

in volume 2, Annex 8.

Activities to influence social norms and be the voice of children took a number of forms, including: working

with national and local stakeholder groups, coordinating bodies, NGOs or children, through advocacy,

professional training, by using the media and through the use of materials, videos and presentations, in many

of which children have participated.

UNICEF’s impact on facilitating dialogue on child friendly social norms was borne out by the stakeholder

survey in the 11 countries. In all countries and territories, stakeholders reported a measurable increase in

understanding and recognition of rehabilitation as the appropriate approach to be taken in dealing with

young offenders amongst all categories of juvenile justice professionals. In some countries and territories,

stakeholders perceive a change in social norms and attitudes in society at large, though measuring such a

change was beyond the capacity of this evaluation.

In Albania, influencing social norms was reported by almost all stakeholders as the main core

role played by UNICEF in the country.116 The Ministry of Justice mentioned that the UNICEF

persistence in bringing up the issue of juvenile justice was the main catalyst for the juvenile

justice reform.

In Georgia, eight out of 18 stakeholders (44%) confirm that UNICEF’s role in facilitating a national

dialogue on introducing child friendly social norms has been significant and has been considered

to be important and influential.

In Moldova 13 out of 16 stakeholders (80%) considered that UNICEF’s role in facilitating the

national dialogue on changing social norms was paramount.

In Ukraine 17 out of 18 stakeholders stated that UNICEF’s role is essential in facilitating the

national dialogue toward child friendly social norms. UNICEF has contributed to the Consultative

Council on juvenile justice under the Institute of Legislation of the Parliament of Ukraine, which

include representatives of all related Ministries and state agencies in the area of JJ. This Council

takes an active part in all legislative, lobby and awareness raising initiatives in respect to children

in conflict with the law in Ukraine.

The change in norms can be seen both from the change in individual stakeholder attitudes towards children

in conflict with the law, and by changes in the system. The reduction of children processed through judicial

proceedings, the reduction in custodial sentences and the increase in the use of diversion (reintegration)

over the period of the programmes, can be taken as evidence that the attempt to facilitate the dialogue on

child friendly social norms has been, overall, successful (see figures 6- 9 and tables 4, 6, 7 and 8) and that

UNICEF has played a significant role in this change.

The survey undertaken with stakeholders asked about the change in attitude of different groups of

practitioners towards the use of reintegration during the course of the project. The respondents to the survey

believe that the greatest change in attitude has occurred amongst social workers, lawyers and staff of

detention centres, while police and prosecutors are considered to have changed their attitudes the least.

However, even in these last two categories 58% respondents believed that the police were slightly more

supportive of reintegration or significantly more supportive of reintegration, while the figure was 61% for

116 Only the Tirana Prosecutor Office did not mention it in the interview


87

prosecutors. Overall, three quarters of practitioners surveyed for this evaluation believe that the social

assumptions of all the selected professional categories regarding young offenders have changed positively in

the last 6 years.

Table 22: Change in practitioner attitude towards the use of reintegration

Practitioner perception of change in support for reintegration over the last six years among various professional categories

Answer Options Don't know

More

opposed to

reintegration

No

change

Slightly more

supportive

of

reintegration

Significantly

more

supportive

of

reintegration

Response

Count

Police 10% 2% 31% 48% 10% 61

Prosecutor 12% 3% 24% 47% 14% 59

Judge 7% 3% 12% 50% 28% 58

Social worker 3% 2% 12% 34% 51% 59

Lawyer 7% 2% 14% 47% 31% 59

Staff of detention and rehabilitation

centers 13% 4% 11% 47% 25% 55

Comment (optional) 7


skipped question 2


UNICEF also used the media to facilitate dialogue on child friendly social norms. Most practitioners surveyed

could remember at least one media campaign in favour of a greater use of reintegration as the appropriate

response to deal with young offenders.117 However, practitioners’ perceptions of these campaigns were

rather mixed. While 41% of respondents felt that such campaigns had a ‘high’ or ‘very high’ positive impact,

more than 46% felt that the impact was ‘moderate’, ‘low’ or ‘none’.118

Albania: the Probation Service mentioned that the general public awareness campaign on

probation (an example of which was a TV spot with the experience of a child in probation) was

very effective. In addition, the Albanian Foundation for Conflict Resolution mentioned the

UNICEF effort to bring the juvenile justice issue to the larger public through participating with

them in a TV talk-show in 2008. Further the ‘Sky is for All’ public awareness campaign in which

UNICEF participated in 2007 was mentioned as having a positive impact on child friendly social

norms. The campaign produced a series of postcards and a newspaper with the participation of

juveniles in the Vaqarr detention Centre.

117 UNICEF Practitioners Survey, Q.17. Asked “Do you remember any media information campaign in the last six years concerning the legal reforms in juvenile justice at national or local level, encouraging a greater use of rehabilitation as the appropriate response to deal with young offenders?”, respondents answered ‘small or weak campaign”(20.3%), “moderate information campaign”(43.2%), “big information campaign”(10.8%) and “very big information campaign”10.8%, while 18.9% of respondents answered “don’t know/don’t remember”. 118 UNICEF Practitioners Survey, Q18


88

Respondents to the Russian-language questionnaire were more sceptical about the impact and sustainability

of public awareness campaigns addressed at social norms, compared to their counterparts in the western

Balkans.119

Several respondents in Ukraine referred to public campaigns (by extreme currents of the

Orthodox Church) that took a negative position on juvenile justice reform issues. Reforms were

incorrectly presented as leading to an increase in state power to remove children from their

families. As one practitioner observed, “The information campaign against the existence of

juvenile justice was more widespread in Ukraine [compared to information campaigns in favour

of appropriate juvenile justice”]. UNICEF actively tried to counter the negative impacts of such

campaigns with its own information initiatives. Nevertheless, the same Ukrainian practitioner

concluded that “The positive experience of the information campaign on the necessity of an

individual approach to juveniles in trouble with the law has been virtually neutralized by the

negative information of the juvenile justice opponents.”

UNICEF actively reached out to journalists in the Ukraine on the issue of justice for children,

enhancing knowledge on justice for children of 36 journalists through roundtables/trainings with

the office of parliament Commissioner for Human Rights, developing a strong partnership with

the Information Centre for Human Rights and with TV station 1+1 through a MOU. UNICEF also

facilitated establishment of forums for children in conflict with the law to express their views to

the larger community through development of the OneMinutesJr’s videos (in two detention

facilities) and mural painting with French artist, Julien “Seth” Malland (in Kharkiv school of social

rehabilitation). Thirty (30) videos were produced during the workshop. One of the participants

won the grand prize (for One Minute Junior Videos Initiatives) at an award ceremony in the

Netherlands.120

Thus positive campaigns were perceived as having an impact on some sections of the public in

the Ukraine. According to a Ukrainian respondent, “in one survey, of the audience of the

documentary ‘Children behind bars,’ 41% of respondents indicated a positive attitude towards

the term ‘juvenile justice’ […] about 60% said that the movie has changed their original opinion

and understanding of the term ‘Juvenile Justice’.121

Findings directly related only to UNICEF’s engagement in knowledge exchange as defined in the Theory of

Change underpinning this evaluation are difficult to interpret. Most stakeholder respondents, and many

UNICEF staff, did not distinguish clearly between UNICEF’s engagement in knowledge exchange (which is

considered a core role within the Theory of Change underpinning this evaluation), UNICEF’s engagement to

ensure ‘voice’ for children (another core role), and other UNICEF engagements such as promotion of national

coordination structures.

Nevertheless, all stakeholders consulted for this evaluation agreed that UNICEF collaborates with regional,

national and sub-national stakeholders to promote quality knowledge products of its own and others.

119 The same questionnaire was distributed in Russian, English, Montenegrin and Albanian versions. 120 http://www.theoneminutesjr.org/?thisarticle=606 121 Survey of 1,000 spectators during the Docudays Film Festival, held in 8 cities of Ukraine

5.13.5. Enabling knowledge exchange

http://www.theoneminutesjr.org/?thisarticle=606


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Stakeholders also highly appreciated UNICEF’s role in facilitating knowledge exchange between different

categories of stakeholder (civil servant, civil society, development partner) as well as the regional knowledge

exchange. Many stakeholders expressed the opinion that UNICEF was the best placed, or even the only

organisation able to ensure these two dimensions of knowledge exchange.

The EIDHR regional project included several knowledge exchange component: high level regional conference

(activity 3), capacity building through a peer support process (training of trainers) (activity 5), and joint

development of monitoring tools (activity 7). The EU also provided significant support (outside the

framework of this evaluation) to NGOs, strengthening their capacity to participate in multi-stakeholder

dialogues.

Within activity 3, a high-level Regional Conference on Justice for Children was held in Brussels on 27-28 June

2013, with over 130 representatives from the EU and from 21 countries and territories of Central and Eastern

Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States. It was co-hosted by UNICEF and DEVCO. This provided

an opportunity for participants to take stock of the substantial accomplishments in juvenile justice system

reforms over the past decade, undertaken with the support of the European Union, UNICEF and others. Eight

governments used the conference to announce concrete commitments and policy priorities, and UNICEF has

been actively following up with all participants to maintain the positive momentum generated by the high-

level event.

Within activity 5 of the EIDHR / UNICEF project, A ‘Training of Master Trainers’ (TOMT) capacity building

process was organised for seven countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan

and Tajikistan. Approximately 2/3 of the outcomes were achieved, due to a higher than anticipated

dropout/turnover rate. Peer support has contributed to the impact of the activity as well as the sustainability

of outcomes. The trainers’ network includes national training institutes for police, prosecutors and judges.

Some stakeholders did however feel that UNICEF knowledge products are not always relevant to local needs,

or designed with an appropriate format, length and level of language. A few stakeholders suggested that

UNICEF publications promote UNICEF too much, and do not accurately reflect the contributions of other

stakeholders. Further, between 2006 and 2012, UNICEF contracted a large number of studies, often revisiting

the same themes after only a short gap. The recommendations in these studies tend to be repeated, with

little examination of why previous recommendations had not been acted upon. In some cases, several studies

covered similar ground within a relatively short period of time.

UNICEF country office staff considered that enabling knowledge exchange is an area where UNICEF’s Regional

Office had a significant impact; Three quarters of those surveyed assessed this impact as “high” or “very

high.”122

Conscious of the relative success of juvenile justice reform in Montenegro, the UNICEF country office also

organised several regional knowledge exchange activities with the support of the regional office.

122 UNICEF Country Office juvenile justice Survey Q7.5


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At the country/territory level, most stakeholders perceive this role as less important than other areas of

UNICEF’s engagement on juvenile justice issues.123 In Georgia, however, UNICEF’s role in knowledge

exchange was perceived as relatively important.124

New models and pilots for alternative juvenile justice have been developed by UNICEF, including within the

EIDHR regional project. In all countries and territories, pilot projects have had a positive and catalytic role,

including among categories of practitioner and decision-maker not initially strongly supportive of juvenile

justice reform. In several countries and territories, pilot projects have been integrated into the state budget

and multiplied.

In Albania, modelling and piloting was mentioned as important by the General Attorney's Office,

Staff in Kavaja Institution, General Director of Probation, Albanian Helsinki Committee (NGO),

the Centre for Legal Integrated Practices (NGO) and SIDA. They all confirmed the crucial

importance of the UNICEF pilot on mediation, alternative measures through Community service

pilots, in the approval of the law on probation and the establishment of the probation service

and legal aid.

In Azerbaijan an evaluation of the Rehabilitation Centre (a diversion project) referring bodies,

children and parents all gave positive feedback on the project. An evaluation showed a decline

in the use of institutionalisation and detention of children.125 The results of the project led to an

agreement by the Azerbaijan Government to take responsibility for funding the project in Baku

at the end of the pilot phase and to establishing a further 7 centres.

In Georgia, 10 out of 18 interviewed stakeholders (55%) consider UNICEF Core role in modelling

and piloting, one of the most important and strongest points of intervention in juvenile justice

reform. The EUD and Dutch Embassies who financed the main diversion and probation pilot

projects considered these as successful and good examples of the modelling approach.126

In Montenegro, this core role has been perceived as the one of the more successful. The positive

results achieved though the Pilot project on Victim-Offenders Mediation in Bijelo Polje in 2005

led to scaling up this model in 2007-2008 then to its expansion in all the country.

In Tajikistan, an evaluation in 2008127 showed that the two juvenile justice alternatives projects

(diversions project for children at risk of offending and those convicted of a crime) established in

2004 as an alternative to custody, had resulted in an average drop of 42% in the rate of juvenile

offending iin the districts where the projects were operating. At the same time, the rate of

offending by children in the country as a whole, went up by 3%. This led to a third project in

Khujand established by the local government with support from UNICEF, and in 2010 to

replication of the projects across the country.

123 Only 2 of the 16 stakeholders interviewed in Albania and 2 of the 18 interviewed in Ukraine mentioned it as a key UNICEF role. 124 10 out of 18 Georgian stakeholders interviewed consider UNICEF Core role in enabling knowledge exchange, one of the most important and strongest points of intervention in juvenile justice reform. Different stakeholders mentioned the study visits organised/supported by UNICEF, as well as a wide range of events organised by UNICEF for the dissemination of information. 125 Anderson, Evaluation of the Rehabilitation Centre and Legal Clinic, UNICEF 2010. 126 Netherlands financed both projects, the EU financed only the diversion pilot project (2010-2013) 127 Anderson and Ross: Promoting children’s rights in the juvenile justice system in the Republic of Tajikistan: Evaluation of the Juvenile Justice Alternatives Projects, October 2008, Commission on Children’s Rights under the Government of the Republic of Tajikistan; UNICEF and Children’s Legal Centre, UK. The two original diversion projects were set up by the Children’s Legal Centre with support from UNICEF.

5.13.6. Modelling/piloting


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Within activity 6 of the EIDHR / UNICEF project, diversion measures and alternatives to deprivation of liberty

have been supported and negotiations for handing-over of pilot projects to the Government have taken

place, and continue to take place. Achievements that are particularly noteworthy include the expansion to

11 Community Justice Centres in Armenia, from 6 in 2010, in Kazakhstan the scaling up of two additional

community-based diversion and probation schemes, and opening of a victim-offender mediation centre, in

Kyrgyzstan the introduction of probation and consolidation of mediation and handover of three diversion

centres to municipal governments, and in Azerbaijan, the Government took over the expenses and

responsibility over the diversion centre in Baku and agreed to the establishment of seven similar centres in

the country. In Ukraine, UNICEF engaged (for the first time) with the Orthodox Church, to promote conducive

social norms, in response to misguided resistance to juvenile justice reforms within conservative

communities

UNICEF’s juvenile justice work in the countries and territories examined was captured and monitored using

a variety of management tools, such as the Logical Framework, the MoRES framework and the Theory of

Change. Constant staff turnover, which sometimes leaves gaps in programme management, does not help

to retain knowledge within the organisation. In such a context the multiplicity and complexity of the

juvenile justice management tools represents a conceptual and communication challenge, and increases

the loss of institutional memory.

Two regional initiatives are of particular relevance to this evaluation: the Critical Mass exercise, and the

EIDHR project.

The ‘Critical Mass’ exercise which was initiated by UNICEF in 2008, led to the development of a set of

priorities for juvenile justice reform in the region with the aim of encouraging a group of countries and

territories to work with a common set of objectives and priorities and thereby strengthen their approaches,

document their work and share their experiences and lessons learnt. A significant number of UNICEF country

office staff interviewed for this evaluation did not seem familiar with the framework of the Critical Mass

exercise; some suggested that it had been superseded by other frameworks or had existed as a formal

planning exercise but had not been followed through. A review of the Critical Mass exercise was to be

conducted every year. No such documents were supplied to the evaluators; we assume that such review did

not take place. Nevertheless, progress in the six ‘priority areas’ of the Critical Mass exercise can to some

extent be assessed using the findings of the present evaluation. Interviews for this evaluation suggest that

country office staff benefited from the Critical Mass exercise, even if implementation was inconsistent. For

the above reasons, the impact of the Critical Mass exercise is difficult to isolate.

The UNICEF Regional project “Consolidation of Juvenile Justice System Reforms against Torture and Other

Forms of Ill-treatment of Children in Former Soviet Countries and territories” was co-funded by the EU through

the EIDHR Thematic Programme and implemented under the coordination of the UNICEF Regional Office

5.13.7. Ensuring proper internal controls and risk management

5.14. To what extent have the regionally-led initiatives, such as the ‘critical mass’ exercise and the regional component of the EIDHR project, contributed to influencing the determinants and impacting on children?


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between 2011 and mid-2014. This Project aimed at contributing to the development of specialized juvenile

justice systems in line with international and European standards in eight of the eleven countries and

territories examined. It was built on the premise that a comprehensive approach to juvenile justice reform –

tackling legislation, policies, capacities, services, knowledge, beliefs and awareness – was the most efficient

and sustainable way of preventing and responding to torture and ill-treatment of children under arrest and

in detention.

The activities supported under this project are consistently related to UNICEF’s seven core roles.128 The

project could therefore be considered as underpinning all aspects of the UNICEF engagement covered by this

evaluation. Relatively small amounts of financial support were allocated at the national level in five of the

countries covered by this evaluation, according to priorities identified by the UNICEF country offices.

Although modest in financial terms, UNICEF staff in some of these countries reported that resources from

this project represented a significant proportion of the discretional resources at their disposal for juvenile

justice reform. In this sense, the EIDHR project resources had a high strategic value for the UNICEF country

offices’ juvenile justice work. The major part of the EIDHR project resources were allocated to regional

activities. This contribution represented only a part of UNICEF’s resources allocated to regional activities.

UNICEF’s regional office and stakeholders in the countries covered by this evaluation considered the specific

regional level activities supported by the EIDHR project as strategically important. In particular:

A high-level Regional Conference on Justice for Children was held in Brussels on 27-28 June 2013, with over

130 representatives from the EU and from 21 countries and territories of Central and Eastern Europe and the

Commonwealth of Independent States. It was co-hosted by UNICEF and DEVCO. Eight governments used the

conference to announce concrete commitments and policy priorities, and UNICEF has been actively following

up with all participants to maintain the positive momentum generated by the high-level event.

A ‘Training of Master Trainers’ (TOMT) capacity building process was organised for seven countries: Armenia,

Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. The trainers’ network included national

training institutes for police, prosecutors and judges. Approximately 2/3 of the outcomes the lower than

expected rate was due to a higher than anticipated dropout/turnover rate as a result of transfer of

participants to other jobs or areas. These outcomes appear to be highly sustainable, with integration of

training outputs into the curriculum of relevant training institutions, and the emergence of a regional peer

support network among participants.

The activities supported under this project are closely associated with three determinants of UNICEF’s ToC:

Adequate legislation and policy in place, access to adequate staffed services, facilities and information, and

conducive social norms. Stakeholders generally considered the EU contribution to UNICEF work on these

determinants to be relevant, timely and effective. This report identifies these three determinants are as

having the greatest direct and indirect impact, as well as the greatest catalyst role (see Conclusion 15)

One of the main indicators for the EIDHR project was a series of improvements in the treatment of complaints

of ill treatment of children in police or detention facilities. The main activity to achieve this was a participatory

research project with Ombudsman offices and NGOs.129 The research process contributed to strengthening

the capacity of human rights NGO and ombudsman offices in monitoring torture and ill-treatment of children.

128 The ToC developed at the start of this evaluation related the EIDHR project contribution to only three of the determinants in the Theory of Change that underpins this evaluation: Adequate legislation and policy in place, Access to adequate staff services, facilities and information, and Adherence to required quality of services. The EIDHR project is also relevant to the determinant availability of essential commodities, but this was not selected for assessment during this evaluation. 129 Activity 7 of project EIDHR/2010/252-238


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The research had three main components: surveys of the experiences of children; the effectiveness of

mechanisms for the investigation of torture and ill-treatment, and the impact of torture and ill-treatment on

victims. Eight national reports were prepared and launched, in some cases with significant media and

stakeholder interest. The research process has triggered a series of in-depth reforms in several countries,

including Ukraine, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan and Azerbaijan. No progress was

observed in Armenia, where there were officially no such complaints during the period of implementation of

the EIDHR project, and no official data about the treatment of any outstanding complaints.

In all countries covered by the regional EIDHR project, UNICEF worked with penitentiary authorities and NGOs

to improve the human rights monitoring in places of detention. In September 2012, towards the end of the

period under evaluation, in Georgia, UNICEF was able to use reports of torture and ill-treatment in

penitentiary establishments, including in facilities housing juveniles, to leverage broader support for reform.

According to one report, “UNICEF has coordinated with government officials and NGO representatives and

has used the crises in penitentiary system as an opportunity to advocate for the creation of a sustainable and

effective rights monitoring mechanism.”130

Azerbaijan: the establishment by the Commissioner for Human Rights (Ombudsman) of a Child

Rights Unit has had a positive impact on detention conditions. UNICEF closely supported the

Ombudsman Office, with training and with technical assistance to the State Committee on

Family, Women and Children Affairs and the Ombudsman office. According to the Country Office,

“before UNICEF these two organizations didn’t see their role as including a juvenile justice

component.” The Ombudsman valued the help of UNICEF in carrying out research, provision of

technical expertise, showing them how to monitor and evaluate, awareness raising activities,

legislation, analysis of legislation and lobbying.131

In Armenia, sources interviewed for one recent study reported that the establishment and the

activities of the existing independent monitoring groups have made a significant contribution to

improving the treatment of prisoners and detainees. A Human Rights Defender was established

in 2003. A study in 2010 reported that it had received few complaints of violations of the rights

of children.132 In 2011 a child rights focal point was established within the institution.

Country-level activities towards juvenile justice reform were largely focused on the development of policies

and of draft legislation and procedures for adoption by government, and the development and capacity of

government agencies. All UNICEF project documentation consulted reports that Government officials were

involved in the design of interventions; even where for example UNICEF worked directly with NGOs or

engaged consultants. The involvement of Government officials was typically within a framework of

consultation, with UNICEF drafting documents and Governments approving them. In most countries and

territories, there was a gradual increase in ownership over the time of the programme, in the sense of

government interest in, identification with and active engagement with the juvenile justice reform process,

and responsibility for the outcomes achieved.

130 UNICEF Georgia country report 2012 131 Chief of Staff and his team, Human Rights Commissioner (Ombudsman) office 132 O’Donnell (2010) Assessment of Juvenile Justice Reform Achievements in Armenia, UNICEF Regional Office for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia

5.15. Sustainability: To what extent have the concerned Governments owned the juvenile justice reform process and committed to sustain it?


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In Georgia, all interviewed stakeholders consider that the Government’s active ownership of the

reform has been central to the successes achieved.

o The creation and the running working group on JfC co-chaired by the Ministry of Justice and

UNICEF on which the draft of the juvenile code will be soon finalized;

o Starting from pilot projects promoted and supported by UNICEF, the Government has

generalized service provision and taken over responsibility for salaries, including for

probation officers for probation measures, lawyers for the free legal aid and social workers

for diversion measures.133

o Starting from training activities for juvenile justice professionals, initially promoted and

supported by UNICEF, the state training Centres for juvenile justice practitioners have

integrated these elements into their curricula, and ongoing training costs for introductory

trainings, and for trainings at the police academy are most covered by the state budget.134

UNICEF continues to provide technical and financial support for skills-based, specialised

trainings for a range of justice professionals

o Renovation and reform has brought the detention centres for juveniles in line with

international standards).

Montenegro: since 2007, the Government (both the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of

Labour and Social Welfare) have taken an increasing ownership of the reform process, becoming

key players in developing and applying the reform. 135

Moldova: the Government has played an increasingly active role in the design and

implementation of juvenile justice reforms since 2009. In 2011 the Government developed an

ENPI Justice Sector Reform Strategy and Action Plan 2011-2016, which clearly indicates financial

commitments, goals and benchmarks to achieve.136

In the group of countries and territories selected for this evaluation, there was evidence of increased political

support to the implementation of the juvenile justice reform. In some countries and territories there was

clear political support by elected officials. In others there has been a gradual integration of juvenile justice

reforms into the state sector. Political support does not, however, always translate into budgetary

allocations, at least within the timescale of this evaluation.

The clearest evidence of political support for juvenile justice reform is in Georgia, Moldova and Montenegro.

All Georgian stakeholders confirm strong political will coming from the government to continue

criminal justice reform, and Administration of juvenile justice in particular. Government is willing

to take a lead and own the process of reform (chairing the inter-agency coordination council,

heading different thematic working groups, responding to the policy briefs to make necessary

amendments to the legislation, institutional framework, etc.). To continue this successful trend,

133 Georgia: interviews with National Probation Agency, Legal Aid Service and Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Assistance 134 Georgia: Interview with Police Academy. 135 UNICEF "Juvenile Justice System Reform” project 2008-2010, UNICEF "Justice for Children” project 2012-2014. Both projects were funded under the EU’s IPA. 136 Justice Sector Reform Strategy and Action Plan 2011-2016 - pillar 6 “Justice for Children” (Financing Agreement EU-Government of Moldova 2012 ENPI/2012/023-420 Support for Justice Sector Reforms


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all government stakeholders stressed the importance of continued support from development

partners and in particular UNICEF, in areas such as piloting, training and policy dialogue.

In Moldova all stakeholders confirmed the political will of the Government to lead and

implement the juvenile justice reforms. The perspective of closer association with, and possible

future accession to, the European Union was identified by all stakeholders as a catalyst in the

process of ownership and the financial support from EU is considered an opportunity for the

sustainability of the whole process.

In Montenegro, all stakeholders highlighted the high commitment of the Government towards

the juvenile justice reform and its persistent engagement in the activities throughout the years.

This proactive attitude to juvenile justice seems to have been even more pronounced than the

Government’s commitment to other reforms relevant to child protection.

In Albania and Armenia there seems to have been a lack of government support for juvenile justice reform

in the period 2006-2012.

For example, in Albania, staff of UNICEF, the EU and NGOs characterised the government’s

attitude to juvenile justice reform as fluctuating. A large body of draft legislation has been

produced with UNICEF’s support but without significant interest from the parliament. In 2009,

and again in 2012, UNICEF warned that the government had no juvenile justice strategy and

action plan.”137

The majority of interventions examined either worked through or were embedded within existing national

structures; even where pilot diversion projects were established on an ad hoc basis, a de facto cooperation

mechanism with local police and prosecutors was established.

In some countries and territories, government participated, and even formally owned the coordination

process, but in reality relied on UNICEF to shadow and support, perhaps to substitute, in the coordination

role.

Ukraine: the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Interior, the General Prosecutor’s Office, the

Probation the Service, State Penal Service and Judges confirmed that they were involved at

different levels in consultation and coordination mechanisms on the implementation of the

reforms and in training and workshops on the new legislation and its application. However, most

of these and most other stakeholders’ perception is that UNICEF was responsible for

Interdepartmental meetings and the meetings of the Consultative Council on Juvenile Justice.

UNICEF and some other stakeholders have argued that juvenile justice reform may generate savings for the

state budget. Direct savings are linked, for example, to the lower cost of diversion compared to detention,

and the impact of shorter average detention. Indirect savings could also be achieved, to the extent that

juvenile justice reforms contribute to reductions in juvenile offending, reduction in cost to the court system,

legal aid and to the negative consequences of juvenile detention. These arguments have not found a

137 EC Progress Report, Enlargement Strategy and Main Challenges 2012-2013, 10 October 2012, WD(2012) 334 final – pp. 19 and 22

5.16. To what extent have the concerned Governments and national NGOs the capacity to sustain the juvenile justice reform process?


96

receptive response with the governments of the countries and territories concerned, with the possible

exception of Montenegro. Juvenile justice reform is still hampered by the need to convince governments to

allocate ‘additional’ resources to reform measures, including diversion and social work provision, without a

recognition of the longer term savings that this could generate.

Only a few countries and territories have made national resources available for juvenile justice reform in a

systematic fashion. In most countries and territories examined, juvenile justice is not identified within the

national budget. Some countries and territories continue to rely on donor and NGO funding for social service

and diversion schemes, and to provide much of the expertise for juvenile justice reform. In several countries

and territories, there have been recent indications of cuts in provision, reflecting the local impact of the

regional financial and social crisis.

Governmental budget commitments seem to be falling in Tajikistan, and stagnating in Albania, Armenia and

several other countries and territories. Even where government resources are increasing, as in Georgia and

Montenegro, these are rarely earmarked for juvenile justice; in none of the countries examined could it be

said that government financial commitments meet the policy and action plan implementation requirements

for juvenile justice. Government mid-term expenditure frameworks in a few countries and territories reflect

continued support to the implementation of justice sector reforms, but again, there are few or no specific

commitments to juvenile justice.

For example, in Georgia, the national budget is increasing annually; however, it is difficult to track to what

extent the financial recourses of public sector increased specifically for juvenile justice reform.

Nevertheless, in several of the countries and territories, there are at least some signs of increasing financial

commitment.

Armenia: most of the 11 community justice centres have closed or face closure following the end

of development partner and INGO funding.138 However, the two community justice centres

supported by UNICEF (Kapan and Talin) have been adopted by local authorities.

Azerbaijan: state funding has been gradually increasing, and so has the state’s willingness to

provide certain forms of support to non-state actors active in this sector. The Ministry of Labour

and Social Protection has been funding the diversion centres for the last two years, and is

subcontracting service delivery to some 30 NGOs. The agreements with the NGOs were initially

funded from the president’s reserve fund, but “next year it will be from the state […] It is good

that the government take over these policies and support their own resources.”139 Another

Ministry representative explained that “in any case for the last few years the financial resources

that UNICEF have provided has decreased – they only provide technical assistance; as for the

financial capacity we can continue without it. We can continue without UNICEF.”140

Kosovo: The Kosovo Ministry of Justice has increased the financial resources allocated to the

juvenile justice reform process. The Kosovo Correctional Service and Kosovo Probation Service

138 Centre for Educational Research and Consulting (2013) Final Evaluation of “ZANG” Armenian Legal Socialisation Programme (for PH International and US State Department 139 Chief of the Department of Social Protection, Ministry of Labour and Social Protection 140 Head of Department of Children Affairs and her team, State Committee for Family, Women and Children Affairs


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have specific budget centres for support to juveniles who are in conflict with the law. As one

example of financial commitment, the Ministry of Justice has co-financed the EU project to build

an open facility for juveniles with educational-correctional measures that will be built in 2015 in

Lipjan. The Ministry of Justice is committed to ensuring that the facility is fully functioning by

allocating a proper budget and appointing staff.141

In some countries, government has recognised that some juvenile justice reform can be achieved without

significant budget implications.

For example, in Kazakhstan until 2012, specialized children’s courts handling cases of offending

by juveniles, as well as other cases involving children were only operational in Almaty and

Astana, but since 2012 they have become operational in every region of the country. Juvenile

justice cases actually form a minor part of the caseload of the children’s courts, which spend

much of their time dealing with family and administrative cases. The Supreme Court has

accepted that the costs of expansion of this specialised court network can be offset by the

reduction in the caseload of the adult courts, and a subsequent reallocation of human and

financial resources.

There is some evidence of increased human and institutional capacity in place for the sustained

implementation of juvenile justice reform process. UNICEF has had considerable success in supporting

national training institutions for juvenile justice practitioners to integrate juvenile justice reform into their

curriculum. The EIDHR project was an important source of funding for these activities. However, funding cuts

or fluctuations in funding, which were being threatened towards the end of the evaluation period may lead

to the dissipation of the human and institutional capacity. Institutional rotation of staff and natural wastage

of staff also has the possibility of reducing human and institutional capacity.

In Albania, turn-over of judges and prosecutors was reported as a problem by UNICEF, Centre for

Legal Integrated Practices, Albanian Foundation for Conflict Resolution and Mediation and

Albanian Helsinki Committee.

In Georgia, there has been an increase in the staff in the Crime Prevention Centre of the Ministry

of Justice, allocation and training of additional social workers in the National Probation Agency,

Ministry of Corrections, and an increase in the number of prosecutors and judges who are trained

to deal with juvenile offenders. In the detention Centres, an adequate number of social workers

and teaching staff have been allocated. In the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Inspection of

Minors was eliminated in November 2006, leading to some staff redundancies. The turnover of

ministry staff at decision-making level as well as at implementation level is still an issue in

Georgia.142 Conversely, juvenile justice practitioners interviewed did not identify any problem of

excessive turnover of prosecutors and judges.

Several respondents in Tajikistan expressed concern with a high turnover of staff, and lack of state

resources to continue with training outside the ODA framework.

In all countries and territories, practitioners (both civil servants and NGO staff) considered that there has

been an improvement in collaboration between the state institutions responsible for juvenile justice and

141 The role of UNICEF is assisting on drafting the programmes, managing and supervising system, job description of the staff, updating the existing curricula, drafting regulations, training of staff on the methods of monitoring and reporting, etc. 142 Georgia: interviews with National Probation Agency, MoC, and Special Establishment for Juvenile Male Offenders in Avchala


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NGOs in recent years.143 This is likely to strengthen the human and institutional capacity, through a more

efficient (networked) use of the limited human resources in the countries and territories concerned. This

collaboration may also lead to the identification of private and ODA resources for NGO projects to address

specific gaps in state provision. No respondents for this assessment identified state-NGO competition for

resources as a significant problem in this sector in these countries and territories at this time.

More generally, however, in almost all of the countries and territories surveyed there are significant limits to

state-civil society cooperation in the field of child protection.

The most recent UN-level Universal Periodic Reviews (UPR) of the human rights situation report

a lack of state cooperation with NGOs in some countries and territories (Azerbaijan 2012,

Kazakhstan 2007).

The latest UPR for Tajikistan “notes the efforts made by the State party to involve the civil society

in the implementation of the CRC, by allowing active participation in awareness- raising and

training activities [but] remains concerned that much of this cooperation is project-based and

that the State party relies heavily on NGOs for the implementation of some of the CRC provisions

without providing them with adequate resources, policies and guidelines” (2010, paragraph 22).

The latest UPR for Albania also expresses concern that “the State party relies excessively on civil

society for budget” (2009, paragraph 15).

For Ukraine, the latest UPR “appreciates measures aimed at strengthening the role of civil society

in protecting children’s rights, such as the establishment of the Coalition of NGOs for Children

and the active involvement of civil society organizations in the development of the National Plan

of Action; concerned that the State party’s cooperation with representatives of civil society to a

considerable degree occurs indirectly through cooperation with international organizations or

entities of the private sector” (2011, paragraph 19).

In some countries and territories where cooperation is observed, the UPR suggests insufficient support to

NGOs as partners in the implementation of the CRC (Georgia 2008), or in the design and implementation of

legislation and policies concerning children (Montenegro 2010). On a more positive note, the 2009 UPR for

Moldova “welcomes the active participation of the NGO community in providing social services to families as

well as the collaboration between governmental institutions and NGOs, including through cooperation in the

area of juvenile justice” (Paragraph 23).

The participation of the private sector in supporting the juvenile justice system and its reform is generally at

a very emerging level. For example, practitioners and NGO staff in Georgia identified private sector

companies as potential employers and providers of vocational training for diverted / released children, but

there are few (if any) formalised schemes for this. Stakeholders also commented that the concept of

Corporate Social Responsibility has not yet penetrated the Georgian business culture.

143 UNICEF juvenile justice Stakeholder survey Q5


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The CRC sets high standards for juvenile justice. Meeting international standards has required all 11 countries

in this evaluation to undertake significant structural, legal and practice reforms. As none already had a

specialist juvenile justice legal or administrative structure at the start of the project, the reform process

involved a large number of institutional stakeholders. While significant steps have been made in terms of the

reform, it needs to be recognized that reaching the standards set by international standards and norms is

likely to take some years. Juvenile justice reform should be regarded as a long-term process, and not one

that is subject to a ‘quick fix’.

The countries and territories examined in this evaluation started from a relatively low base. None had a

specialized juvenile justice system, and all have made some progress. In particular, the evaluation found that

the three objectives: reduced detention of children in conflict with the law, reduction in the length of pre-

trial detention and an increased use of diversion were all met, albeit that the extent to which these objectives

were met varied between the 11 countries and territories included in the evaluation.

UNICEF reported in 2013 that the key achievements of the juvenile justice system were:144

Governments’ commitment to juvenile justice system reform has been growing over the last decade;

Significant progress has been made in bringing legislation into line with international and European

standards;

The principle of use of deprivation of liberty as a ‘last resort’ and for the shortest time possible is

increasingly being captured in law and policies;

Diversion, alternatives and mediation schemes are being developed and extended ;

Professionals and institutions are specializing more in child rights;

Civil Society plays a greater role in juvenile justice;

Reforms are starting to be better informed by evidence and research and modelling.

The evaluation validated these findings, all of which are essential to the establishment of a juvenile justice

system that is compliant with international standards.

Key findings

There has been a significant decrease in the number of children in detention during the period under

evaluation and the decline has been constant throughout the period of the evaluation;

The total number of children in pre-sentence and post-sentence detention has fallen by almost 60%,

and the average trend across the 11 countries shows a constant decline between 2007 and 2012.

There has been a steady but modest decline in the percentage of convicted children who serve

custodial sentences

Amongst the countries studied, the proportion of children in conflict with the law who were diverted

from court (either pre-trial or post-trial) almost doubled during the period of this evaluation.145

144 “Juvenile Justice in the CEE/CIS Region: Progress, Challenges, Obstacles and Opportunities”, UNICEF, 2013. 145 Comparison is made with number of convictions plus number of diversions. This metric is chosen because data on number of prosecutions (the metric originally selected) is not available in the majority of countries and territories examined. The increase in the percentage of children diverted continued in 2013, after the end of the period covered by this evaluation.

6. CONCLUSIONS


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Although the increase in the use of diversion is significant, the trend fluctuated. Some of the

improvements in 2006-2008 appear to have been cancelled out in 2009 and 2010, but were then

followed by a strong and sustained improvement in recent years.

The evaluation concluded that:

o The reduction in the rate and length of juvenile detention was closely related to changes in

social norms and access to services such as the existence of trained juvenile justice

practitioners, particularly judges, prosecutors and police, in a context of practitioner

awareness of, and support for, juvenile justice reform.

o Increased rates of diversion were closely related to access to available and adequately staffed

services. The development of diversion appeared to be particularly dependent upon the

establishment of initial pilot diversion programmes and the existence of informed and

trained juvenile justice practitioners, particularly social workers, police and prosecutors.

o Decrease in the length of pre-sentence detention was closely related to legislation/policy, to

reforms in criminal procedure and case management and to the availability of community

based services.

o Government political support and active engagement for juvenile justice reform should in

most cases not be presented as preconditions for UNICEF’s engagement in juvenile justice.

The evaluation demonstrated that political support can be generated during the reform

process using a combination of advocacy and policy advice, technical assistance for capacity

development and promotion of conducive social norms.

The evaluation showed that UNICEF had a particularly high impact on reform through its policy and technical

assistance work, facilitating national dialogue towards child friendly norms and in modelling and piloting,

while the UNICEF research on child rights monitoring under the EIHDR programme was felt by stakeholder

respondents to have been particularly effective. This latter result arose from the EIDHR programme, for

which the results were particularly encouraging.

Although it can be concluded that the juvenile justice programme has resulted in many positive changes, and

represents progress in meeting international standards, it should be recognised that the reform programme

was ambitious and required substantial attitudinal change amongst juvenile justice professionals, public

acceptance of those changes, and significant structural and legal change, with a re-allocation of resources,

both financial and human, from the use of custody to the use of community based options for addressing

offending behaviour by children. The reforms were rightly ambitious and although there has been a

promising start in many of the 11 countries, reform remains fragile. The withdrawal of technical assistance

and donor funding in a situation of economic downturn places reforms at risk. Only using deprivation of

liberty as a matter of last resort and providing alternatives to custody remains a challenge in some countries.

Overall, the evaluation concluded that the UNICEF programme had met its 3 targets and has made a major

contribution to juvenile justice reform in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. The juvenile justice programmes

had considerable impact and resulted in some very positive steps towards the implementation of a juvenile

justice system.

UNICEF’s main contributions to system change have been:


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Evidence of change to social norms and, in particular, a measurable increase in recognition of

rehabilitation as the appropriate approach to deal with young offenders among all categories of

juvenile justice professionals;

Improvements to the legislative and regulatory framework of the juvenile justice system between

2006 and 2012;

The establishment of the community based programmes to address offending behaviour;

Some slight increase in the allocation of funding to juvenile justice, including the funding of diversion

programmes in some countries;

Improvement in the availability and accessibility of services, facilities and information for children in

conflict with the law, including the provision of specialised training, particularly to deal with

vulnerable children which, in many countries and territories this training has been embedded in the

state training institutes for juvenile justice practitioners;

An expansion of relevant alternatives to detention for use by children in conflict with the law, though

the range of alternatives is still limited in most countries and territories;

Greater involvement of social services, health, education and civil society partners in the juvenile

justice process in all countries and territories.

The generally positive findings in relation to service provision was tempered by evidence of fluctuations in

service provision, changes in policy and reorganisation of the civil service and of funding systems following

political developments in several countries. In this sense, improved access to adequate staff services, facilities

and information should not be considered as definitive, but rather as fragile and potentially reversible.

It is also possible to conclude that there was some improvement in access to legal/paralegal services for

children. Free legal assistance lawyers were generally in place, though not always in rural areas. In most

countries and territories, however concerns relating to the experience and competence of the lawyers

remained, due to the low level of training and the low level of remuneration.

However, the evaluation also raised issues, some of which were in UNICEF’s power to address and some

which were not:

Issues of ethno-linguistic, racial and religious discrimination are virtually absent from the discourse

of practitioners interviewed for this evaluation, including UNICEF staff in the region. The

programme’s failure to include racial and ethnic groups facing discrimination and the lack of initial

baseline data on marginalised groups made it impossible to determine the extent to which the equity

gap was reduced or closed in the country and territories covered by this evaluation.

The lack of separate facilities for girls who are detained is an issue in all eleven countries and

territories in the studies. Although this was raised as an issue within the programme, States have not

demonstrated any willingness to provide separate facilities and services for girls, due to the small

numbers involved.

The lack of data and information management meant it was not always possible to measure UNICEF’s

impact on the reform. In some countries and territories, relevant data is not collected, or is not

shared with stakeholders. The most significant data gaps concern allocation of state resources to


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juvenile justice, the length of pre-trial detention, and disaggregation of data. Reasons for this vary.

In some countries and territories, data collected is not collated at central government level and

different agencies produce contradictory statistics. In some countries and territories some

stakeholders reported that the government chooses not to share some data with UNICEF and other

stakeholders. In some cases, refusal to share or publish statistics may conceal the absence or

fragmentary nature of the data held by state bodies. In most countries and territories, gender and

ethnic disaggregated data is not available. UNICEF, development partners and child-focused NGOs

are also short of other highly relevant data, including on recidivism and on children in contact with

the law (which includes all children in contact with the police including children under the minimum

age of criminal responsibility as well as child victims and witnesses of crimes).

Although the evaluation found a good level of engagement with, and ownership of the reforms over

the course of the programmes, this inevitably varied across the countries and territories. UNICEF had

to contend with changes in ruling party and political direction, as well as institutional reform and

turnover of governmental personnel. Institutional support and memory was at times lost. This

created a disabling environment towards progress in the key areas, which may have a negative

impact on the sustainability of the reforms achieved.

Sustainability is also under threat in some countries and territories, because of financial and

economic pressures. There is little awareness on the part of government that introducing diversion

and community programmes may bring about savings, compared to judicial proceedings and

committing children to detention. As such, progress towards juvenile justice results and the excellent

preconditions for the sustainability of these may be reversed

There were some country-specific findings, which can serve as lessons learned for future juvenile justice work:

o Georgia’s juvenile justice reform was particularly strengthened by the expansion and improvement of social work provision, including a sustained commitment to training, and a growing state budgetary commitment to support social work provision

o In Moldova, the change of government in late 2009 and developments within the EU Association

process lead in 2011 to the formulation of the Government Justice Sector Reform Strategy and Action

Plan 2011-2016. This was associated with a steady decline in detention rates from 2011 onwards.

o The Victim Offender Mediation scheme adopted in Montenegro is sometimes considered as a model

in the region. In Albania, a similar scheme was also useful in introducing mediation, advocating for

legislative change and promoting alternative measures and a restorative justice model.

o In Kazakhstan, the creation of a special children’s court has made a clear contribution to the quality

of juvenile justice, with the emergence of a constituency of specialised judges aware of international

standards.

The findings for this evaluation also indicate some areas where national experience may serve as a

caution

o While this evaluation did not attempt to determine a causal link, it is nevertheless interesting to note

that Albania, the country with the highest increase in pre-sentence detention during the period 2006-

2012, is also the country or territory among those covered by this survey which has the most modern

and specialised juvenile detention centre. Some stakeholders suggested that the existence of such a


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centre may, for various reasons, counteract efforts to reduce the number of children detained and

the length of their detention.


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7. RECOMMENDATIONS

Recommendation cluster 1

Intensify efforts to reduce deprivation of liberty for children in specific countries in Eastern Europe and

Central Asia

These recommendations are addressed to all stakeholders

1.1 While the length of pre-trial detention has been reduced in many of the country and territories, the

periods of pre-trial detention generally still fail to meet international standards. There is a need to

continue to support states with their management of cases and in further reforms to criminal procedures.

Further efforts to reduce the average length of pre-trial detention could be based on the experience of

Moldova, which experienced a significant decline in the average length of pre-trial detention during the

period in question, and Montenegro and Kyrgyzstan, which achieved significant declines towards the

end of the period in question.

1.2 UNICEF should consider placing greater emphasis on prevention services as well as further support

of diversion options and alternative (non-custodial) sentences in further juvenile justice interventions.

Prevention is recognized by the Committee on the Rights of the Child in General Comment No 10 as a key

component of a juvenile justice system but was not included within the programme. While the priority

given to diversion was justified, early prevention and intervention programmes should be included in any

further programmes.

1.3 Stakeholders should consider giving further attention to the challenges linked to the provision of

adequate treatment for girls, including adequate conditions for girl detainees, which do not receive

adequate attention, partly because of the cost and logistic challenges of supporting small numbers of

children. This appears to be a problem not just in Eastern Europe and the former USSR. Consideration

should be given to supporting the development of alternative community based and small-scale residential

placements especially for girls as an alternative to placing girls with adult women in prisons.

1.4 1.4 UNICEF and other development partners should reinforce national capacity in the area of

administrative data collection, disaggregation and sharing, as well as directly commissioning relevant

studies to fill the major knowledge gaps that are obstacles to the design, monitoring and evaluation of

reforms and related UNICEF interventions. Increased effort could be made to establish juvenile justice

indicators and responsibility for their collection and reporting at the national level. This would facilitate

national fact-based planning and policy development, as well as international cooperation and

benchmarking. Stakeholders should not become resigned to data gaps, and should seek to associate

quantitative indicators of success with all their interventions. Since collection and use of data on ethno-

linguistic, racial and religious identity is politically sensitive, stakeholders may wish to privilege survey type

solutions rather than the incorporation of these categories into administrative data collection. The

recommendation to facilitate a better quantitative understanding of patterns of vulnerability,


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The following key recommendations emerge from the conclusions and lessons learned which were presented

in the previous chapter. Recommendations are presented in three clusters; Intensification of efforts to

reduce deprivation of liberty for children in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, revision of UNICEF’s regional

Theory of Change for juvenile justice reform, and UNICEF-EU cooperation.

Recommendation cluster 2:

Juvenile justice reform in Eastern Europe and Central Asia could be based on a revised and adapted

Theory of Change

These recommendations are addressed to the UNICEF Regional Office and Country Offices

2.1 UNICEF should focus their engagement on the core roles (Enabling knowledge exchange, Policy

advice and technical assistance, Modelling/piloting) and key determinants (legislation and policy;

adequately staffed services, facilities and information; social norms) that have the greatest catalyst and

multiplier value and the greatest direct impact on the results. Other core roles and determinants

should be addressed consistently with their lower catalytic and multiplied value and their indirect or

minor impact on the results on a country by country basis.

2.2 Within UNICEF, strengthen monitoring and reporting related to juvenile justice and access to justice,

focusing on changes for children/impact and systems level changes and equity gaps rather than on

monitoring of programme delivery. Since UNICEF’s staff and resources available for juvenile justice reform

are rather limited, detailed discussion and complex analysis of core roles does not seem productive at this

juncture.

2.3 UNICEF should ensure that the Theory of Change and UNICEF core roles are adequately understood

by staff and external stakeholders. The TOC should be simplified and appropriate articulations of the ToC

should be systematically included in communications with staff and with external stakeholders, to

facilitate a common understanding of the concepts involved.

2.4 In several of the countries and territories covered by this evaluation, detention is used as a last

resort. In those countries and territories, UNICEF might consider shifting its focus to other aspects of

justice for children, but it should bear in mind that reforms are still at an early stage, are likely to be fragile,

especially where there is a change of government.

R3: The EU and UNICEF could consider reinforcing their cooperation on children’s access to justice

These recommendations are addressed to UNICEF HQ and to the EU (DEVCO and EEAS)

3.1 The EU and UNICEF should consider building upon the EIDHR programme and combining resources

once more to keep the moment of reform in the field of children’s access to justice. Although most of

the 11 countries have made significant steps towards reform of juvenile justice this will undoubtedly need

further reinforcement and support. In addition, there are other areas of access to justice that have yet to

be reformed. Promoting a child-friendly justice system is also a key priority in the EU’s Agenda for the

Rights of the Child. These concerns were echoed by representatives of 22 countries and territories in the

marginalisation and discrimination does not imply that separate services should be developed for each

distinct category, only that such information is a precondition for the equitable approach to children in

conflict with the law.


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high-level 2013 Regional Conference on Justice for Children, co-organised by the EU and UNICEF. The

relative success of the EU and UNICEF-supported juvenile justice reform constitutes a fruitful basis for a

broader engagement in favour of children’s access to justice.

3.2 Stakeholders could consider developing benchmarks and indicators of progress in juvenile justice

reform in the region, including by drawing on the UNICEF/UNODC indicators. This could inform the EU

and other development partners in their allocation of funds to this sector, and the prioritisation of support

to specific aspects of juvenile justice reform in specific countries.

3.3 The EU and UNICEF could consider giving increased support to actions that empower children as

actors for juvenile justice reform, and in defence of their own rights regarding the justice system.

Producing internal and external training materials and methodological tools to support such

activities

Giving a greater priority to actions that include activities that empower children as actors in their

own development, including in juvenile justice reform.

More systematically integrating children’s testimony into their own activities.

3.4 The EU and UNICEF could consider expanding their cooperation on juvenile justice reform and

children’s access to justice in the region. Juvenile justice reform remains a regional priority for UNICEF

and the EU, reflected in the policy cooperation and in EU funding to the sector, including to UNICEF. The

EU could take the findings of this evaluation into account in its country-level political and operational

cooperation across the region. At the regional level, the EU could consider further targeted support to

juvenile justice reform through the Thematic Programmes EIDHR and Global Public Goods (which replaces

Investing in People), as well as in its civil society support facilities across this region.

3.5 The EU and UNICEF could consider expanding their cooperation on juvenile justice reform and

children’s access to justice outside the region. The political basis of the EU’s commitment to juvenile

justice reform can be traced to decisions that apply to the ‘southern neighbourhood’ countries of North

Africa and the Middle East, and to a lesser extent to all developing countries. The EU may wish to consider

giving a higher priority to juvenile justice reform in other countries that have similar characteristics to

those covered in this evaluation, replicating some aspects of the policy and operational cooperation with

UNICEF and other stakeholders, including partner countries and CSOs which is analysed in this report.