USAID's Justice Project in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Quarterly Report

The project is a five-year initiative funded by USAID, with the purpose of strengthening justice sector capacity. Millennium DPI Partners, a woman-owned small business, is implementing the project, which will be operational until September 22, 2019. The objectives of the Justice Project are to enhance prosecutors' status and performance, the enforcement of court decisions, the integrity of the justice sector, and the capability of courts and prosecutor offices to prosecute and enforce the law against corrupt officials. To achieve these objectives, the project will address mechanisms of judicial self-accountability, such as ethics and discipline, and enhance inter-agency cooperation, training, and tools for judges and prosecutors. In the first quarter, the project focused on laying the groundwork for the implementation of activities that will be carried out in the months and years to follow. The project team developed the Year 1 Work Plan, established partnerships and cooperation with prosecutor offices, courts, government, and the non-government and private sector, and identified Bosnia and Herzegovina, regional, and international short-term experts and developed their Scopes of Work. The approved Year 1 Work Plan is the result of a highly consultative process, which included desk research on BiH legislation and policy, key institutional and country strategic documents, European Union, Council of Europe, United Nations, and other international community rule-of-law-related assessments and recommendations to BiH, and international and donor standards, practices, and experiences in strengthening the capacity of a developing country to fight corruption. Qualitative interviews were also conducted with representatives of relevant national and international stakeholders. Millennium DPI has initiated the necessary steps to organize a program office and meet with counterparts and USAID to develop and submit initial deliverables. The start-up team included Tim Hughes from the National Center for State Courts, who provided support for the development of the Year 1 Work Plan, and Igor Beznitsky, who set up the accounting system and invoicing and procurement procedures for the project. The draft Year 1 Work Plan and Performance Management Plan were submitted to USAID for approval and review on November 24, 2014. The project has made significant progress in the first quarter, with the establishment of partnerships and cooperation with key stakeholders, the development of the Year 1 Work Plan, and the identification of short-term experts. The project is now fully operational, with all staff recruited, including the Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist, who joined the project team on January 19, 2015.