Press Release

People’s Advocate of Albania organized on 10-th of December 2009, the Internatioanal Conference on the topic “Human Rights, Good governance and Performance of Ombudsman”. This Conference was motivated by 10-th anniversary of the establishment of Albanian Ombudsman Office and 61-st anniversary of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, approved on 10-th of December 1948.

This activity was held under the auspices of the President of Albania, Mr. Bamir Topi, and was attended by Vice Chairman of Albanian Parliament, Mr. Ardian Turku, Minister of State Mr. Genc Pollo and numerous personalities and dignitaries from abroad.

On this occasion, the President of Albania assigned to the Albanian People’s Advocate Institution, the Order “Mother Theresa”, motivated by professionalism and independence, performed by this Institution. The order was given to the Albanian Ombudsman, Mr. Ermir Dobjani, who thanked the President and assured him once again that “his office will continue to follow up his philosophy, thus by being always an opponent for good governance”. The 10-th anniversary of its establishing, found the Albanian Ombudsman Office with a triple status, i.e. as an Ombudsman Office, as National Human Rights Institution (Paris principles), and as National Mechanism for Torture Prevention, under OPCAT.

The Conference was attended by representatives of many Ombudsman offices, among which by Danish Ombudsman, Mr. Hans Gammeltoft Hansen, who spoke about “The best practices of international counterpart offices”, Parliamentary Swedish Ombudsman, Ms. Kerstin Andre, who spoke about “Experiences of Swedish Ombudsman with Prosecutor’s Office and Judiciary”, Bulgarian Ombudsman, Mr. Ginyo Ganev, who spoke about “Specific work of Ombudsman in Ballcanic countries”, Ombudsman of Catalonia, Spain, Mr. Rafael Ribo, who spoke about “Access of citizen to the offices of public administration and to the Office of Catalonian Ombudsman”, Greek Deputy Ombudsman Mr. George Moschos, who spoke about “Experience of Greek Ombudsman related to the protection of children rights”.

The conference was attended as well by Macedonian Ombudsman Mr. Ixhet Memeti, Kosova Ombudsman, Mr. Sami Kurteshi, Deputy Omdudsman of Netherland, Ms. Adriana Stehouwer and other representatives from counterpart offices.

Spokesperson of Albanian Ombudsman Office