United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

The UNODC Regional Office in East Africa (ROEA)

UNODC Supports Quality and Effective Investigation, Prosecution & Custodial Services in Ethiopia

Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), 12 February 2021 – With the support of UNODC, a national consultation group composed of federal and regional criminal justice institutions and their corresponding training institutions, came together in Addis Ababa to review the training needs of police, prosecutors, and prison officers. The priority of this team is to support the delivery of quality and effective investigation, prosecution and custodial services that can be institutionalised by the Ethiopian criminal justice system and training institutions at both regional and federal levels.

This national consultation – facilitated by UNODC – follows a request made by the participating Ethiopian government criminal justice actors and their corresponding training institutions to undertake a training needs assessment.

This initiative forms part of the UNODC Regional Programme, Supporting Transformation, Peace and Security in the Horn of Africa (2020-2021), generously funded by the Government of Japan. In Ethiopia, the programme targets key criminal justice partners and prison institutions, as well as police and prosecution officials and is geared towards strengthening operational and technical capacities of institutions.

In close cooperation with the national institutions, UNODC conducted the training needs assessment during the second half of 2020, results of which are now being used to inform the design, development and content of a training curriculum, training manuals, and specialized training activities for the respective criminal justice actors and training institutions. The assessment identified evidence management, child justice, gender mainstreaming, human rights-based practices, among others, as the priority skills and knowledge areas that institutions would like to further incorporate into their training agendas.

Opening the consultation, the Representative a.i. of the UNODC Programme Office in Ethiopia, Margaret Akullo, encouraged participants to develop an approach that would ensure the sustainability of the endeavor. She reminded participants that “the COVID-19 pandemic had forced the world to re-think the way it delivers on its commitments and so there was a need to incorporate online training platforms as an important and sustainable future investment.”

At the event, UNODC Programme Advisor Ermiyas Kostre, guided participants through the assessment methodology, the data assessment, and the recommendations. Participants then provided their feedback on the findings of the assessment and how to best embark on the actual training development and delivery at Ethiopian criminal justice training institutions.

The participating officials raised a number of additional training gaps in the UNODC 2021 Training Needs Assessment Report, ultimately validating the document. Its recommendations will now provide the groundwork for further collaboration on curriculum development and specialized training, and UNODC and its partners have already sprung into action by planning the first series of trainings.

Throughout the first half of 2021, UNODC and the Ethiopian criminal justice actors and their training institutes will jointly deliver specialized training on a variety of areas targeting the key criminal justice actors including police, prosecution and prison officials. The educational experience will encompass human rights, prosecution-led crime investigation, crime prevention, child justice, gender responsive criminal justice practices, and inter-agency cooperation – among others.

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