ASEAN countries promote judicial cooperation

 

Singapore (VNA) – Chief justices of the 10 ASEAN countries have agreed to strengthen cooperation and information sharing in the judicial field in order to create more favourable conditions for residents as well as foster regional trade and investment.

Accordingly, a portal of ASEAN Judiciaries at www.cacj-ajp.org was officially launched in the framework of the 6th Council of ASEAN Chief Justices (CACJ) meeting held in Singapore on July 27.

The event saw the participation of Chief Justices from the 10 ASEAN member nations. The Vietnamese delegation was led by Chief Justice of the Supreme People’s Court Nguyen Hoa Binh.

Speaking at the launch ceremony, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Singapore Sundaresh Menon stressed that in addition to introducing the legal systems of ASEAN to increase understanding of the regional laws and foster trade-investment flows into the bloc, the portal serves as an important channel for the member countries to share experience and propose measures to improve their judiciaries’ standards via support and training cooperation.

This is the first important step in the effort to enhance collaboration among ASEAN judiciaries, based on the application of high technology in the court sector serving national and regional interests, he said.

The member countries will then carry out next steps to improve the capacity of judicial organisations and facilitate people’s access to justice, he added.

The portal was funded by the Norwegian Government through the Norway-ASEAN Regional Initiatives Fund with a value of 3.6 million NOK (400,000 USD). The money is used to operate, develop and maintain the portal until July 2020.

Talking to Vietnam News Agency correspondents on the sidelines of the meeting, Chief Justice Nguyen Hoa Binh said that as the Chair of the CACJ in 2016, Vietnam made practical contributions to realising the portal project as well as building the Charter of the CACJ and cooperation mechanisms on information sharing between ASEAN courts.

Especially, within the framework of ASEAN, Singapore supported Vietnam in building and issuing a code of judges’ ethics which was appreciated by public opinions at home and abroad; applying information technology in court activities; and improving professional capacity for judges.

At this meeting, chief justices of the 10 ASEAN countries discussed a wide range of important issues such as creating a coordination mechanism between chief justices to share information while handling civil and economic cases as well as trade disputes and matters related to marriage, verdict management and IT application in court activities, and judicial training.-VNA