|
From March to November 2000 our organization, CCI, began working on the project “Regional office for human rights”, which was funded by USIS - American Embassy in Macedonia. Because it showed that this office has great importance for our region, we continued the same project and in the period February-July 2001 the donor for its realization was the Dutch Embassy in Macedonia.
The idea for establishing a regional office came from the fact that people in Macedonia know very little or they don’t know anything for their rights and that they are often in situation when their rights are violated. They also don’t know whom to address when their rights are violated, and we think that it is a result of the new democratic processes in our country as well as the transition process, which also is a new experience for the citizens.
Our organization, after long and detailed surveys and analyses determined the basic goals of this project, and those are:
| |
- Registration and documentation of the complaints for violation of the human rights;
|
| |
- Helping citizens by offering legal advice or any kind of help as for example: contacting appropriate institutions for them;
|
| |
- Informing citizens about their rights and the institutions that are competent to help them;
|
| |
- Increasing the knowledge of people in the field of human rights.
|
Within the project there was an open line for reporting the cases for violated human rights in the whole region (the region encircles the municipalities of Prilep and Krusevo). Also one psychologist volunteer and a lawyer was engaged, who directly contacted all the people that were reporting the cases of violated human rights and registered them. The office was in the premises of CCI, where one person-volunteer from CCI was engaged and run all the reported cases.
Aiming at increased informing of the citizens, CCI prepared and printed posters and leaflets about the kind of rights that we have, how can we realize them and about the equality of the human rights for all the people. In the accomplishment of this activity huge part took all the young members of our organization, who covered the whole region with posters and leaflets. The project was also covered through the media through TV spot, public announcements, press conferences etc. 
There were also organized public lectures in Krusevo and Prilep and Krivogastani on the topics from the area of human rights, which arose great interest that was obvious from the great attendance by the citizens. The lecturers were experts in that area.
One of the biggest gains from this project is that the people who needed a legal advice got it free of charge, i.e. our lawyer run the legal procedure until the case was solved through court channels.
In the office the citizens from this region were looking for help and advice every working day and the number of the reported cases was bigger every day. Statistically, the biggest part of the cases were about social problems, family violence, juvenile delinquency and drug abuse, physical violence and abuse.
|
