The inappropriate areas for questioning children, unclear legislation and repetitive interviewing are the shortcomings that still persist in juvenile justice in Moldova. Representatives of the Justice Ministry, foreign experts and a number of NGOs in a working meeting discussed the intersector cooperation in investigating cases involving child victims or witnesses of sexual abuses and serious crimes.

Bert Groen and Nigel King, experts of the Netherlands Center for Social Development MOVISIE, encouraged Moldova to learn from the international experience and to start making changes to the procedures for questioning child victims and witnesses of crimes.

The representatives of the Justice Ministry said that the justice sector reform strategy for 2011-2016 includes actions aimed at ensuring child-friendly juvenile justice by setting up areas for questioning and assisting children in courts of law, prosecutor’s offices and police stations.

The working meeting was held within the project “Structural interviewing of child victims and witnesses of crimes”. The project is implemented in Moldova, Latvia, and Bulgaria by the Netherlands Center for Social Development MOVISIE with support from OAK Foundation in 2012-2014.