New Child Helpline in Tirana

TIRANA, Oct. 9 – The Children’s Human Rights Center of Albania (CRCA) said that it had established a new telephone help-line for children in Tirana. It has called it ‘Tirana Child Helpline’ and the project has been funded from the European Commission aiming at assisting children. “I’m pleased that after one year of work Tirana Child Helpline is fully operational and children are calling us to report cases of abuse or other problems they face in their life,” said Altin Hazizaj, CRCA head. “Now we are aiming to make the Helpline operational at the national level, meanwhile a set of training courses on child abuse has been provided to all Governmental and non-governmental structures in Tirana.” Tirana Child Helpline is the very first professional helpline in Albania and was opened officially in October 2005. During these months the line has been working directly with children and adults, assisting them with advise, consultation and training. The range of services offered by the Helpline includes an 8-hour phone line to children and direct consultation with psychologists, social workers and lawyers of CRCA. The operators of the phone-line are students from Social Sciences University, which have been trained by international experts. Another major activity of Tirana Child Helpline has been the capacity building measures for local institutions in Tirana. Several training courses on child abuse have been provided to people who work with or for children, meanwhile a set of child-care standards is in its final review. The aim is to have common child-protection standards used by all institutions in Tirana.