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Summer 2018 News from Victim and Witness Support Service Croatia

By September 3, 2018February 1st, 2021News

Victim and witness support service’s newly opened office in Varaždin went through management change at the end of June and now, instead of Larisa Spahić, the new head of office is Barbara Oreški (Master of Law). As the project “Network of support and cooperation for victims and witnesses of crimes” in collaboration with Ministry of justice goes forward, since the office opening date in February, there have been nearly 80 consultations with emotional, practical and/or legal help. However, for a comprehensive support co-operation is necessary.

While some meetings are still in planning process, we have established excellent cooperation with the Regional Court, Municipal and Misdemeanor Courts, The Police Administration, The Social Care Centers, The State Administration Offices, The Regional Health Care Center, The Public Health Institute and the Emergency Medicine Institute. So, we try to be present in every institution where a victim or witness could come and seek help. We must point out that none of the doors we have knocked, either for cooperation or information for our users, have remained closed.

Installing the victim/witness stand in Municipal county in Čakovec

Also, we’ve set up a few of info desks at crucial point where we predicted a critical mass flow and organized a public action in Novi Marof and Čakovec where we, together with our volunteers, promoted the project for the members of the wider public.

At Police HQ in Varazdin

From June to August, we held six out of seven workshops in Vukovar-Sirmium and Osijek-Baranja County, within the project “3 -PIP – Support, Information, Legal Aid to Protect the Elderly” funded by the Ministry of Family, Youth and Social Demography. The first workshop was held in Nuštar, then Ilok, Borovo, Dalj, Đakovo, Vukovar, and on this occasion we thank the municipalities on the allocated space, passing invitation to the locals, and the discussion. Participants were informed and educated about the legal consequences of entering into lifelong life support agreements and the consequences of other criminal offenses at the expense of the elderly, the rights of victims / witnesses and victims of criminal offenses, rights in the social care system of particular importance to older persons such as non-institutional services, and violence against the elderly. The last one in Osijek remains in September.

At the end of June, 29 June 2018, a lecture by the TransAid association was held to the volunteers of the National Call Center – 116 006. Matea Popov, head of the psychological support program of the association TransAid, held a lecture on “Providing trans, inter, and gender variants support”. The lecturer presented the scope of the TransAid association and initially clarified the concepts of trans, inter, and gender variants. She presented experiences from the counseling center and informed about the issues that people encounter.

Coordinator of the National Call Center – 116 006 Ana Šeničnjak and executive director of the Victim and witness support Croatia attended a conference on the presentation of the report “Position and rights of victims of criminal offences ” on 6 July at the Journalism house. The conference was organized by Documente – the Center for facing the past, where the results of the work were presented in the Report:,, Position and rights of victims of criminal offences “.

On Monday, July 16, we marked the 5th anniversary of National call center ‘s presence by sending media reports. The NCC has so far received 6950 calls from citizens and citizens

In July, the National call center coordinator Maja Štahan participated in a research:,, Role od NGOs in supporting victims of crimes” conducted by Victim Support Europe to understand the role of civil society organizations in the victim support and witness support system.

On the occasion of the ending of the project ” Be my friend/ Don’t be my foe!” we organized a round table titled: “The importance of the development of school volunteering in the prevention of violence among youth”. During the round table we presented the project results and the handbook.

 

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