On Thursday, the Mobile Institute for Democratic Education (IMED) in partnership with the United Nations Mission for the Support of Justice in Haiti (Minujusth) launched a project to reduce the prolonged preventive detention of children in conflict with the law and facilitate the care of 200 juveniles in pre-trial detention at the Rehabilitation Center for Minors in Conflict with the Law (CERMICOL) and at the prison of Port-au-Prince.

Kettly Julien, a member of the IMED, said that this program, funded by the UN Mission, will cost a little more than 12 million Gourdes (12,387,950), and will initially be concentrated in the metropolitan area for 12 months before to be deployed in provincial cities. Moreover, he deplores the fact that minors, as soon as they reach the age of 16-17, are transferred to the national penitentiary without a lawyer, nor to aid agencies that can take care of them.

TB/ iciHaiti