Background

EUCJ has a closure date of October 14^th 2018 and is on course to fulfil all contractual requirements - outcomes, outputs and activities. In the final year the emphasis should be on the project’s legacy in terms of:

• Sustainability of the changes and results delivered by the project

• Local ownership of the ongoing work arising from the project

• Continuing availability of the resources and products created in the lifetime of the project

• Continuing commitment to ongoing criminal justice modernisation

This will require EUCJ to have:

• Integrated team working

• Dynamic and influential external communications

The EUCJ Strategic Framework and Stakeholders

EUCJ has four strategic objectives that have resonated with the current modernisation agenda of criminal justice in the Republic of Kazakhstan:

• Managing offenders and risk of harm - to make society safer by managing offenders well

• Policy and evidence - to develop better policies by employing evidence and stakeholder engagement

• Fairness and transparency - to build trust and confidence in the system

• Change and capacity - to transform the nature and performance of the system

Across its spectrum of work, the project offers three types of support:

• International expertise and examples to both widen the options under consideration for change and enable comparisons to internationally recognised standards of best practices

• Proven models and methods to successfully implement and embed major change programmes including governance, project management, employee engagement and capacity building

• Evaluation and learning processes to foster dynamic and innovative cultures that can continuously improve performance and adjust to society’s evolving demands and needs

From the outset of its work, which began in October 2015, EUCJ has focused its support on the key criminal justice agencies:

• The General Prosecutor’s Office including its Legal Statistics Committee

• The Ministry of Internal Affairs, particularly probation and, latterly, prisons and the police

• The Supreme Court

• The main professional academies - Law Enforcement Academy, Kostanay Academy, and the Academy for Justice

• The Bar Association

• The Ministry of Justice

Successes to date

The 2018 Strategy is established in the context of a successful two years of operations:

• Logframe requirements have been accomplished

• Activities are on target for completion in early 2018

• Probation reforms are established in statute and practice

• Change algorithm and Project Management models used by the project have been adopted by several government departments as well as the President’s Administration

• GPO institutional reforms are passed the tipping point of fundamental and unprecedented transformation and the recently appointed new General Prosecutor has produced no significant modifications to the course of reforms and project management set by his predecessor, Mr Assanov

• The Law Enforcement Academy, Kostanay Academy and the Academy of Justice are all progressing well in the modernisation of training methods and curriculums

• An extensive resource bank has been generated on criminal justice, training, project management and change leadership issues

Shortage of resources and time

The situation for EUCJ’s final period is one of escalating demands and dwindling resources. Approaches in the last quarter of 2017 have come from the MoI to support pilot Rehabilitation Prisons, the President’s Administration to bring international expertise both to the Criminal Procedure Code (CPC) reform process and to begin transformation of the police with MoI, the GPO to help with piloting of the CPC and Protection of Public Interests operating models, and the Supreme Court, now with Mr Assanov as Chief Justice, to support a major national change programme.

Prioritising is vital to manage demands within the available budget which needs to be supplemented by targeted fundraising. This requires a coherent strategy that has stakeholder understanding and support whilst satisfying the EU that the best legacy impact will be achieved for their investment. At the time of production of this paper (10^th January 2018), The new GP has yet to meet EUCJ and agree what he wants from the project and so all remaining GPO work is currently suspended. All other stakeholders have approved the schedule of work EUCJ is now able to undertake in 2018.

The strategy continues to pursue the themes in the framework (see above) but with a set of principles that particularly apply to the circumstances of these last months.

Strategic Principles for the Final Year

Seven principles underpin the strategy for the period January to October 2018:

1. Complete all contractual obligations

2. Build on the achievements to date

3. Prioritise securing depth of impact and inter-agency cross fertilisation

Principles 1 to 3 are fulfilled through the 3 strategic priorities detailed below. The remaining principles will be evidenced in the following ways:

4. Publicly celebrate success through stakeholders

Encourage and support stakeholders to capture success stories of working with EUCJ and jointly disseminate through their internal communication networks and intranets, the mainstream media and social media with the aims to gain EUCJ visibility through stakeholders and build their:

• professional pride

• momentum for change

• trust from the public

5. Complete hand overs and all final reports

Agree an exit strategy with each stakeholder for every remaining action as detailed in Annex A and produce a set of end-of-project reports chronicling progress made, issues encountered and results secured according to the four strategic framework objectives and by each stakeholder and beneficiary group.

6. Keep EUD and stakeholders closely involved

Provide each with briefing notes on overall project progress every 2 months, as well as individual review meetings on a frequency appropriate to the work in hand, supplemented by Steering Committee meetings in April and September 2018

7. Fully utilise the skills and experience embodied in the EUCJ team

Ensure full contributions of appropriate team members in the direct provision of facilitation, training, expert input and professional services, reducing reliance upon international short term experts

Strategic priorities

These plans are all based upon occurring no additional costs by utilising team expertise and aligning project work taking place across MOI, GPO, LEA, AOJ, KA, SC and BA to common strategic goals that will provide the best legacy and sustainability outcomes

1. Complete remaining contract activities

This strand of the strategy aims to finalise contractual obligations in a timely manner and to the best standards that available resources will allow. It also introduces a formalised process of handing over to meet sustainability requirements rather than just closing involvement at the time of EUCJ’s activity completion.

• Activities Plan and Final Budget - already in place (see Annex A).

• Fundraising for events - already underway. Some activities require events that the remaining project budget can not support. Cost-sharing measures with other agencies and donors will enable some of the original plans to be accomplished. This is not a contractual shortfall but one of wanting to meet stakeholder expectations and best outcomes.

• Handovers - sustainability plans are to be integrated within each remaining contracted activity. Currently activities are undertaken and concluded without formal consideration of sustainability issues. There is not a prescribed process for handing over continuing work after the completion of the EUCJ activity responsibilities and this needs to change in the forthcoming months and be monitored and reported upon.

2. Depth for sustainability

This strand of the strategy aims to embed the key developments EUCJ has been engaged with:

• New professional capacities

• New ways of working

• New models of practice

2.a Professionalising change at the Supreme Court and MoI with subjects including:

• Change leadership and governance

• Standards in the use of project management

• Employee engagement and HR requirements

• Communications and stakeholder strategies

• Addressing professional development implications

• Improving evidenced based decision making and changes

2.b Mainstreaming new ways of working - to be add to the resource bank after 'testing' with selected stakeholders covering:

• Systems and processes design to deliver goals and results

• Business process assessment and development

• Changing behaviours

• Setting new standards and KPIs

• Managing risks and advancing innovation

• Training needs assessment

2.c Scaling up and replicating pilots - presenting common best practice frameworks for GPO, SC, and MoI to include:

• Pilot design and evaluation

• Identifying lessons and local variants

• Identifying key success factors and business critical design features

• Producing the new working model - processes, people, technologies

• Planning and delivering by replicating

• Constructing a specific change and project management capability for scaling up and replicating (internal and shared)

3. Cross fertilisation for legacy

This strand of the strategy aims to build interagency cooperation both for better results and for stronger unity towards change - a feature of the EUCJ contract but one that has had limited success because of rivalries and disinterest amongst criminal justice agencies. This will be addressed by:

• Leadership from the President’s Administration

• Promoting the judicial chain through EUCJ’s work and relationships

• Evidencing and emphasising community benefits from collaborations

3.a Common risk assessment format - offender risk management system to be overseen and approved by a specialist criminal justice inter-agency panel where the interagency Offender Risk Panel:

• Provides a united understanding, commitment and agreement to standards

• Advances what sound risk management can achieve for the public, government and individual justice chain institutions

• Sets standards and principles for the assessment and review of risks

• Provides examples of appropriate different applications of those common standards and applications

3.b Inter-agency collaboration - capturing best practices in criminal justice agency work on collaboration and crime prevention:

• Emphasising interagency collaboration to tackle causes of crime, reoffending and public concerns about safety

• Promoting the messages that identify how policies and practices between agencies can be better aligned

• Promoting local inter-agency teams to undertake joint working with comprehensive membership understanding safety priorities and delivering effective interventions

Annex A

Completion of current contractual requirements - Strategic Priority 1

Negotiations have taken place with all stakeholders to obtain agreement on the final set of activities to be undertaken to meet EUCJ’s contractual obligations to EU and be affordable within the remaining financial resources. This has required significant trimming compared to the proposed work plan submitted to the Steering Committee in October but has been accepted by the stakeholders. The main actions to take place are:

• Surveys on crime, safety and policing and on the quality of justice in court proceedings

• Supreme Court administration reform

• Criminal Justice Forum policy developments

• Offender risk assessment system for law enforcement agencies

• Piloting probation services

• Piloting rehabilitation prisons through a NGO partnership

• Piloting police reforms with MoI (additional to contract)

Much of this work will be completed by March 2018. The risk assessment and pilots are expected to be ongoing until May 2018, MoI work stream is ongoing and growing, whilst the two major surveys will be ready for publication in August 2018.

Activities Planned in the Next Six Months from Nov 2017 – April 2018

Component 1: Criminal Justice Policy and Strategy

Output 1.1: (ST3&4) Criminal Justice Reform Analysis Facilitated

Activity 1.1.1 (ST2 & ST3) Organizing study on effectiveness of criminal justice reforms (Also Strategic Priority 2a)

Quality of justice survey

The fieldwork shall commence in late October 2017 to collect 1200 interviews. The data collection is planned to be finalized by April 2018, presentation is scheduled for summer 2018.

Policy Analysis on the EU CPC models

The project will develop and produce comprehensive policy analysis on the best practices of modernization of the CPC in Europe. This document will inform further development of criminal justice policy in Kazakhstan. To be completed in January 2018.

Commentaries on the draft law on CPC reform

The project will provide legal analysis of the draft law on CPC reform and its adherence to best EU practice. Completed in November 2017.

Activity 1.1.2 (ST2) Conducting empirical and legal analysis of conditions for high conviction rates (Also Strategic Priority 2a)

The report shall be completed by the end of 2017 to provide empirical evidence for the institutional reforms of law enforcement agency for successful criminal justice system. To be completed in Feb 2018.

Activity 1.1.3 (ST3) Developing Strategic Approaches to Crime Prevention (Also Strategic Priority 3b)

EUCJ will provide technical assistance on the Istanbul protocol regarding investigation of crimes of torture. EUCJ will also organize monitoring and assessment of the results of the pilot projects on investigation of complaints of torture, currently undertaken in several regions. To be completed in March 2018.

Activity 1.1.4 (ST2) Analysis of business processes and strategies (Also Strategic Priority 2b)

The Supreme Court has requested to change this activity in the Workplan in the light of change happening in organisation. The analysis of business processes and strategies of the Supreme Court. Study visit for the best EU practices. Ongoing work until April 2018.

Activity 1.1.5 (ST2) Promoting uniformity in judicial consideration of new types of crimes

The project will deliver the policy analysis of court administration in Kazakhstan including recommendations on bringing it in line with EU best practices. The report shall be presented at the Conference in November, organized for the visit of the President of CEPEJ. This activity is complete.

Activity 1.1.7 (ST4) Develop reform evaluation and management capabilities

The project will complete the process of standardization of the project management methodology at the GPO and evaluation of key projects. The project will support delivery of expertise on launching of the Strategic Development Department at GPO – the center for continuous improvement and innovation of justice system. Completed in December 2017.

Activity 1.1.8 (ST4) Develop criminal justice reform governance and intelligence

Continued national support for the GPO Change Programme by attending meetings of the Board and providing targeted expert assistance to the Project Management Office will be expanded by training, mentoring and support for Change Agents now present in every GPO department and Oblast. Complete.

Activity 1.1.9 (ST4) Develop bottom up fact gathering and analysis to inform the design and implementation of criminal justice reforms

Continuation of the EUCJ work programme from previous plan will proceed, leading to self-sufficiency with GPO regarding the process and content of the change programme.

With EUCJs support, the GPO change governance and employee engagement has been cascaded to connect the GPO central hierarchy, Oblasts and districts to share information, develop solution based knowledge and learning. The process is developing a local receptivity and flexibility to participate in and contribute to change as well as system wide transformation. EUCJ will deploy national and international experts to assist Change Agents in their early establishment phase to work successfully in their own Oblast, motivating, engaging and mobilizing local employees as Transformation Leader Teams and Clubs. This Oblast level work will feed into the Cascading Change Action described below and in the previous progress report (Annex 12). Complete.

Output 1.2 (ST3&4) Multi-agency dialogue on justice reform improved

Activity 1.2.1 (ST3) Facilitating organization of the Criminal Justice Policy forum

The project shall organize policy discussions on the reform of the criminal procedure legislation with the EU experts and policy makers. The discussion shall be held either on the independent platforms or at the key stakeholders: GPO, Parliament. Completed in Nov 2017.

Activity 1.2.2 (ST3) Developing legal framework for implementation of decisions of international bodies

Discontinued. No further EUCJ activity planned following stakeholder discussion and prioritising.

Activity 1.2.3 (ST3) Developing and implementing communication strategies of criminal justice actors (Also Strategic Priority 3b)

It is planned to take this work forward in the coming months, new Communication Strategy for the Supreme Court. The work will be implemented during Jan-April 2018.

Activity 1.2.5 (ST3) Organizing hands-on workshops on interagency cooperation on criminal justice issues (Also Strategic Priority 3b)

EUCJ will support organization of platforms to enhance interagency cooperation. One way is to improve information and expertise sharing through expert debates on criminal justice policy & practice. The project will also organize two criminological expert fora in the new format of policy debates. The dates are tentatively set for the end of 2017 and beginning of 2018. More workshops will be organised for the Supreme Court by April 2018.

Activity 1.2.6 (ST3&4) Cascading Change: Develop inter-agency reforms for community benefit including community safety (Also Strategic Priority 3b)

Support to Presidential Administration ‘Rukhani Zhangyru’ programme includes the future police development agenda under the Ministry of Interior (Police). Three month development plan support runs from November to January 2018.

Output 1.3 (ST2) Criminal Justice statistics further developed

Activity 1.3.1(ST2) Integrating modern measurements tools into assessment of criminal justice system (Also Strategic Priority 2a)

Integrating modern measurements tools - Victimisation survey

The field work shall commence in late October to collect 3000 interviews. The data collection is planned to be finalized by April 2018. Further work on analysis and recommendations shall continue to summer of 2018.

Integrating modern measurements tools - support to the survey on measuring public trust to law enforcement agencies

The project will work with the LSC to integrate the methodology of the Rule of Law index into the modern tools for measuring public trust to law enforcement. Experts shall provide analysis of existing data on public perception measurements. To be complete in August 2018.

Activity 1.3.2 (ST2) Piloting the software on “E-criminal case” (Also Strategic Priorities 2b and 2c)

The project will support the piloting of the E-criminal software by, budget permitting, providing simple data recording software to optimize the work of law enforcement officers. The region of Northern Kazakhstan is ready to apply this to the work of police officers. Blockchain seminar Jan 2018.

The project will also provide expertise to support implementation and evaluation of the pilot project on the new model of criminal procedure in two regions of Kazakhstan. Ongoing support until April 2018.

Activity 1.3.3 (ST2) Promoting user-friendly resources on criminal justice statistics

Discontinued. No further EUCJ activity planned, as explained in relevant activity section above.

Activity 1.3.4. (ST2) Improving analytical and statistical instruments (Also Strategic Priority 3b)

The project will support the work on developing innovative ways of ensuring information security of criminal justice analytical software. Support will also be provided on data analysis and building algorithms to inform crime development and system analysis. This will involve sharing best EU practices on IT, which also includes a study visit to St Petersburg, Feb 2018.

Activity 1.3.5 (ST2) Reviewing performance indicators of prosecutors and judges (Also Strategic Priority 2a)

The project will provide information on EU experiences on the development of strategic indicators for the organization and mechanisms for individual performance evaluation. Ongoing until Jan 2018.

Component 2: Modernizing Sentencing

Output 2.1 (ST1) Penitentiary policy development supported.

Activity 2.1.2 (ST2) Integrating international best practices on prison reform (Also Strategic Priority 2b)

Following recent agreement, a specific piece of development will be completed on the establishment of rehabilitative programmes in prisons. To be complete in summer 2018.

Output 2.2 (ST1) Establishment of modern probation system promoted

Activity 2.2.2 (ST1) Pilot project on Probation (Also Strategic Priority 2b)

The introduction of revised pre-trial probation practice in test (laboratory) areas, linked with Activity 1.2.6 below (Strategic Theme 4) will be taken forward. To be complete in May 2018.

Output 2.3 (ST1) Policy and Practice on alternatives to custody and imprisonment further improved

Activity 2.3.1 (ST1) Gap analysis and development of practice guidelines on various forms of alternatives (Also Strategic Priority 3a)

Assessment and management of risk of harm through application of international best practices to be introduced as tools, methods and processes available for probation, judges and prisons. Training and dissemination of the risk assessment procedures will be rolled out over the coming three months within trial areas in order to refine the process in the Kazakh context. See also 2.2.1 above. To be complete in summer 2018.

Component 3: Training and Capacity Building (The whole of Component 3 is complete)

Annex B: Summary of Strategic Priorities to Build Legacy and Sustainability

Annex C - Supreme Court Proposition