BackThe Offices of the Human Rights Defender of the Republic of Armenia and the Public Defender of Georgia have been awarded the IOI subsidy for regional projects 2020/2021. The project proposal submitted by the two offices dealt with “Strengthening the Capacities of the Armenian and Georgian Ombudspersons in Monitoring the Socio-Economic Rights during Emergency Situations” and entailed the following objectives:
- develop a Guideline on monitoring the socio-economic rights by Ombudsperson institutions during the emergency situations;
- enhance the capacity of both institutions through holding a joint capacity-building training on monitoring the socio-economic rights during emergency situations following the developed Guideline prepared by the external expert.
The project was being implemented by two partner institutions, which are both members of the IOI, with a long-standing cooperation reflected in a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed in October 2019.
The duration of the project was two years and during its implementation the Ombudsperson of Armenian and Georgian had an opportunity to discuss a wide range of issues related to challenges in monitoring socio-economic rights during emergency situations. Project experts conducted extensive research in this direction, held interviews with the representatives of implementing institutions, reviewed legislation and policy documents, as well as academic materials and prepared a guideline that reflected recommendations on how to overcome monitoring challenges during emergency situations. At the end of the project, online training was conducted for the staff of the Armenian and Georgian Ombudsperson institutions.
The project was an excellent example of regional cooperation with the leadership of IOI and can be used as a basis for similar initiatives in other IOI regions.
Source: Office of the Public Defender, Georgia
