
Hanoi (VNA) – The Ministry ofJustice (MoJ) and the US Agency for International Development (USAID) held aforum in Hanoi on September 15, looking into the promotion of justice accessamong low-income people and vulnerable groups.
Opening the event, Deputy Minister Nguyen KhanhNgoc said Vietnam has obtained a number of achievements in law completion andenforcement to enhance people’s access to justice and law, especially amongpoor people and vulnerable groups.
He noted the 2013 Constitution along with manylaws and sub-law documents have been issued, showing Vietnam’s commitment toensuring human rights and the equality of all people in the society. Theapparatus and operations of law enforcement agencies have been reformed towardsefficiency, integrity and transparency.
However, authorised agencies have also realisedthat much remain to be done to perfect the legal framework and better enforcelaw, especially to ensure the access to justice by low-income earners andvulnerable groups, the official added.
Nguyen Thi Minh, Director of the MoJ’s NationalLegal Aid Agency, said the Law on Legal Aid was first issued in 2006 and itsamended version was approved in June 2017. The revised law increases the groupssubject to legal aid from six to 14.
She said the expansion of the beneficiary groupsdemonstrated the Party and State’s comprehensive attention to vulnerablepersons. The provision of full and quality legal aid for the groups will helpimplement social welfare policies well.
The expansion of the subject groups also means asharp rise in the number of people that need legal aid. This is a big challengeto authorised agencies and requires them thoroughly prepare personnel andfinancial resources to ensure the law’s feasibility.
Minh noted aside from the state budget’sfinancial support, local administrations need to proactively mobilise privateresources and international organisations’ assistance to this work.
Do Xuan Lan, Director of the MoJ’s Department ofLegal Dissemination and Education, said grassroots reconciliation will helppeople come to know about their rights and legitimate interests when facingconcrete cases, helping them have appropriate choices and reactions.
Agencies should combine grassrootsreconciliation with lawyers’ activities, law advice provision, legal aid, lawdissemination, and complaints and denunciation settlement so as to deal withdisputes in a timely manner, he added.
At the forum, participants also discussedensuring justice for gender-based violence victims, grassroots reconciliationfacts, and regulations on legal aid, among others.-VNA