Co-ordination meeting “Together for Justice”

CRP Sisak, together with partners in the project “Creating a new model of inter-sectorial cooperation for the protection of national minorities and socially vulnerable population”, organized a meeting of the Coordination Body in the City Hall, in Sisak on 31st of January 2014.
The representatives of civil society organisations, local government and state institutions met and discussed issues in relation to the cross-sectorial co-operation at the local level, free legal aid and other assistance to vulnerable population groups in the Sisak- Moslavina County.
Considering the fact that this meeting is the first in a row of the coordination meetings within the project, CRP Sisak briefly reported on its current activities and projects. Partners in the project; Center for Rural Initiatives from Klinac, Youth Association New World Luščani and Roma Cultural Centre, in addition to their brief presentations, reported about co-operation with CRP and activities carried out within the project of inter-sectorial co-operation funded by the EU and co-financed by the Croatian Government. This project is being implemented until 30th of June 2014.
The first issue of newsletter “I have a right” was presented at the meeting. It represents an example of good practice in protecting of rights of vulnerable groups and it is a human rights guide for the local population. Some proposals were given at the meeting for the second issue of the newsletter that should be printed and distributed during February. The proposals and discussion related mainly to social welfare and the new Law and it was decided that the next issue would cover this issue.
Many participants, representatives of various institutions / organizations / government, including the Town of Sisak, Sisak-Moslavina County, UNHCR, Center for Social Welfare, took active role in the discussion, giving their suggestions for improving inter-sectorial co-operation and stressed the need for more frequent meetings like that in order to jointly resolve certain administrative and court cases on behalf of the clients, beneficiaries of free legal aid. It was concluded that it would be good to organise meetings with specific agenda. The first one could be with the Sisak-Moslavina County in order to discuss the cooperation of local authorities and civil society, as well as financing of NGOs.
Business lunch and refreshments followed at the end of the meeting.