Centre for Civic Education (CCE) today donated two hundred collected books to enrich the library fund of the Administration for the Execution of Criminal Sanctions (UIKS), and hence to contribute to the improvement of the quality of life of persons who are serving prison sentences, i.e. to acquire some new knowledge under those conditions and to have more content within their free time.
Citizens had the opportunity to donate books through two conducted street actions. Also, other entities positively responded to this action and in that respect we express our thanks particularly to Italian Cultural Centre, Faculty for Montenegrin Language and Literature and Open Cultural Forum. Individually, the most publications were donated by Nevenka Nikolic, Andjelija Vesna Cosovic and Milos Knezevic.
During the delivery of the books in the premises of the UIKS, Tamara Milas, from the CCE, stated that this ‘donation represents an expression of the CCE’s efforts to influence decrease of recidivism and improvement of resocialization of persons deprived of their liberty in cooperation with the competent institutions, but it also aims to change the attitudes towards persons deprived of liberty and include community into their reintegration’.
Milan Radovic, Head of the Centre for Education thanked to the CCE for the donation and said: ‘Donation of books is another proof of the good cooperation of the Administration for the Execution of Criminal Sanctions (UIKS) with the Centre for Civic Education, and non-governmental sector in general. In the constant effort of the prison system to improve prisoners’ rights and conditions in which they reside, any help that support this commitment of the Administration is welcome to our institution. Enriching prison libraries is one of the measures for better quality of cultural content for prison population and certainly in support of their treatment programmes that are being developed and implemented in prisons. Administration would like to thank to the Centre for Civic Education for taking care about the needs of prisoners and contributing to satisfaction of those needs in the best manner.‘
This action is part of the project ‘Alternative sanctions – from punishment to reintegration‘, which objective is to contribute to the improvement and protection of human and minority rights in Montenegro through active participation of civil society organizations. More specifically, the project is directed at capacity strengthening of the competent authorities in order to improve the quality of respect for fundamental rights of persons deprived of liberty in Montenegro and at cooperation of civil society organizations and competent authorities in valorising alternative sanction mechanisms as more active contribution to respect for fundamental rights of persons deprived of liberty in Montenegro.
The project ‘Alternative sanctions – from punishment to reintegration‘ is implemented by the CCE in cooperation with the Institute for Legal Studies (ILS), with the support of the Ministry of Justice of the Government of Montenegro.
Vasilije Radulovic, Programme Assistant