Justice Minister visits Bulgaria to share prison know-how
06 November 2008
A new partnership between the prison services of the UK and Bulgaria was announced today by Justice Minister David Hanson.
The UK will work with Bulgaria to provide expertise, training, development and assistance within the country's criminal justice system. The work will look at supporting offender behaviour and rehabilitation programmes in Bulgaria and introducing performance management standards.
Mr Hanson announced the partnership on a visit to Bulgaria where he saw the Stoletov prison which already runs projects to help rehabilitate offenders. These programmes are the result of an earlier twinning programmes between the UK National Offender Management Service (NOMS) and Bulgarian General Directorate Execution of Sentences.
Mr Hanson said:
'I'm pleased to visit Bulgaria to see first hand the results of earlier cooperation between our two prison services. We will build on this through our further work in important areas such as rehabilitation and offender behaviour programmes.'
During the visit, Mr Hanson also visited the Lozenetz Probation Centre where further partnership work is being undertaken, including establishing core training for probation staff and assisting with new programmes such as those tackling drugs.
Notes to editors
1. David Hanson visited Bulgaria on 4 and 5 November 2008.
2. For more information call the Ministry of Justice press office on 020 3334 3536.
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