On 6 June at the Shirak branch office of the Armenian Lawyers’ Association (ARMLA) Civil Society Institute (CSI) organized a workshop on the Prospects of Development of the State Probation Service in cooperation with the State Probation Service of the MoJ of RA and the Armenian Lawyers’ Association.

Regional officers of the State Probation Service, representatives of the Ministry of Labor and Social Issues, State Employment Agency, CSI, ARMLA and the NGO’s of Shirak region participated in the meeting.

The workshop was aimed to introduce to the participants of the meeting the functions and main tasks of the State Probation Service. One of the goals of the workshop was to promote the cooperation of the state bodies and NGOs thus forming a platform which will enable the establishment of the effective cooperation between the NGOs and the State Probation Service. In case of such cooperation NGOs will assist in the implementation of the functions of the Service, will develop and conduct projects connected to those functions.

During the meeting the main functions of the Probation Service were presented, the screening of the film on the Probation Service took place, the prospects and opportunities of the cooperation between state institutions and NGOs, as well as the problems of the education and employment of convicts were discussed.

The working meeting was organized in the framework of "Towards the Probation Service in Armenia" project with the financial support of the UNDEF.