Featured Story

ABA Rule of Law Initiative Welcomes Rob Boone as Its First Director

ABA Rule of Law Initiative Director Rob Boone

On August 1, 2007, the American Bar Association (ABA) welcomed Rob Boone as the Director of the Rule of Law Initiative (ROLI), which implements the ABA’s overseas rule of law technical assistance program and related activities, currently operating in over 40 countries worldwide.  As the first Director for the Rule of Law Initiative, Mr. Boone will oversee the Association’s recently consolidated rule of law programs in Africa, Asia, Europe and Eurasia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Middle East and North Africa.

Mr. Boone arrives at the Rule of Law Initiative following six years with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).  While Chief of the Human Security Branch at UNODC headquarters in Vienna, Austria, he oversaw development and implementation of rule of law operations worldwide.  He also served as Chief for Treaty and Legal Affairs.  Before his tenure in Vienna, he spent more than three years in Pretoria, South Africa, as the UNODC Representative for Southern Africa.  In that post, Mr. Boone led the organization’s regional field activities, including its training and technical assistance operations.

Before joining the United Nations, Mr. Boone held positions in Washington, D.C., including as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State (Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs), where he helped develop and manage multilateral and bilateral rule of law and related foreign assistance activities.  He also served as a Special Assistant in the Executive Office of the President.  He clerked for the Hon. Richard A. Gadbois, Jr. (Central District of California) and while in private practice was a business litigation attorney in southern California.  He holds a Master of Science degree from the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service and is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School.

Europe and Eurasia

Georgia "Street Law Program" Celebrates International Children’s Day

On June 1, 2007, the Rule of Law Initiative’s Georgia office, together with administrators from Tbilisi State University, TSU Law Faculty, and the Ministry of Education and Sciences of Georgia conducted a joint street law event to commemorate International Children’s Day.  Approximately 75 students from three Tbilisi public schools (#53, #151, and First Experimental High School) participated in their first interactive street law training, at the end of which the students watched and discussed a animated program on street law animation developed by the Initiative’s Georgia office late last year.

Rule of Law Initiative Junior Staff Attorney Medea Matiashvili and five TSU law students introduced the high school students to street law and conducted three demonstrative trainings on conflict resolution, human rights, and civil law matters.  The selected TSU students had participated in the ABA-funded “Train the Trainer” program, which took place at Georgetown University Law Center during fall 2006.  To prepare for the event, TSU law students and Initiative staff modified the lesson plans to suit the purpose of the event and the young target audience.  The principals from each high school attended the event and asked the organizers to bring the street law project inside their schools.  Later during the month, the Georgia office received a thank you note from TSU Rector Gia Khubua for organizing such an interesting event. 

The Rule of Law Initiative and TSU Law Faculty plan to cooperate on opening a Street Law Clinic as a for-credit course in fall 2007.  Contact Senior Legal Advisor Nino Khurtsidze (nkhurtsidze@abarol.ge) for more information.  

Initiative Participates in Georgia's First Comprehensive Mock Trials

Prosecutor Besik Bekauri makes his opening statement to the judge

Georgia’s first ever mock trial with prosecutors, advocates, and judges all participating was held on June 16, 2007, thanks to the efforts of the ABA Rule of Law Initiative’s Georgia office and the United States Department of Justice Resident Legal Advisor.  The case scenario for the joint mock trial, held at the Tbilisi Appellate Court, involved neighbor threatening another neighbor. Participants from the Prosecutor General of Georgia, the Tbilisi District and Appellate Courts, the Georgia Legal Aid Office, and the Georgian Bar Association all came together in making this event a success.

A total of thirty trials with sixty advocates and prosecutors and fifteen judges were held with patrol officers and law students serving as witnesses.  To prepare judges, prosecutors, and advocates for an adversarial process—which is included in a new Criminal Procedure Code expected to be adopted this fall—the Rule of Law Initiative and the RLA developed training programs tailored specifically to each participant in the adversarial trial.  In this year alone, the Initiative‘s Criminal Law Program has trained thirty trainers and over 150 advocates in advocacy skills.  In some of those previous trainings prosecutors and advocates argued cases against each other, but this was the first time that Georgian judges presided over these mock trials. 

These same trials will be repeated in July and are expected to expand in the fall into trainings held outside of Tbilisi in the various regions of the country.  For more information please contact Mamuka Mamatsashvili at mamuka@abarol.ge or Matt Reger at matt@abarol.ge.

Armenia Holds Second Bar Exam with ABA ROLI Support

Students checking exam scores

The Chamber of Advocates of the Republic of Armenia, with technical and financial support from the ABA Rule of Law Initiative, conducted its second annual bar examination on August 25, 2007.  ABA ROLI support included the organizing of monitors for the exam and the underwriting for the computer program at the exam.  It was Armenia’s first anonymously scored bar exam, with each applicant being identified using a bar code.  The exam was administered to one hundred and ninety-five students who took either the criminal or the civil examination. Two candidates were disqualified during the exam. Of the remaining candidates, approximately fifty percent passed the exam with successful candidates equally divided between the two specializations. The exam lasted six hours and was computer-scored. The results were posted at the office of the Chamber of Advocates in Yerevan. To be fully licensed, each successful candidate must also complete an oral exam to be held in September.

Initiative Trains Bahraini Judges, Prosecutors on Freedom of Information

Mitchell Pearlman addresses workshop participants

ABA Consultant and Trainer Mitchell Pearlman, an international expert in the field of Freedom of Information (FOI) law and administration, was posted in Bahrain from May 19 to 30, 2007, at the request of Bahrain Minister of Justice Sheikh Khalifa.

Pearlman led FOI workshops for Bahraini judges and prosecutors and met with senior officials of the Bahraini Ministry of Justice (BMoJ) and Islamic Affairs. Discussions focused on the theoretical and practical issues regarding Bahrain's possible adoption of access to government information legislation.

Pearlman also delivered additional seminars on the subjects of Freedom of Expression (FOE) and Freedom of Association (FOA). In preparation for and in response to requests arising during his programs in Bahrain, he produced a number of documents, analytical reports, and training materials.

ABA ROLI Sponsors Regional Networking for Iraqi Lawyers and Judges

The Rule of Law Initiative recently held a three-day Rule of Law Conference in Amman, Jordan, with support from the British Foreign Commonwealth Office. The goal of the conference was to create an opportunity for judges and lawyers from Basra to network with their colleagues in other countries. The conference brought together forty judges and lawyers from Basra, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and Bahrain, and topics of discussion included the rule of law and conflict, judicial ethics and independence in conflict situations, and the protection of children in conflict. Participants from each country discussed various national and regional activities in which they were involved. The group then discussed networking strategies they could implement to facilitate future contact, sharing of information, and best practices.

Programs in Morocco and Algeria Receive Awards for Capacity Building and Training

Panelist speaking at the conference

The Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) has recently funded a thirteen-month grant for Morocco and a sixteen-month grant for Algeria that began on May 31, 2007. The Legal and Judicial Development awards will build on the Initiative’s previous work creating more accountable, effective, and independent judicial systems in these countries. Both projects will work with the national judicial training institutes to increase capacity-building for judges, focus on civil society capacity-building to support judicial reform, and develop public legal education campaigns. Under the new Algeria Legal and Judicial Development Award, the Initiative facilitated a Maghreb Judges’ Conference in Algiers on July 10 and 11, 2007, in collaboration with the Algerian National Judges’ Syndicate. The conference, focusing on judicial ethics and deontology, included the participation of eighteen high-ranking judges from Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia who gathered to discuss the importance of judicial ethics and share ideas about how to promote judicial standards of conduct and the challenges associated with this. The Algerian representatives discussed their recent adoption of a national charter on ethics and others highlighted the challenges in adopting a similar code. At the end of the conference, the participants from the three Maghreb countries decided to continue sharing experiences and ideas through the creation of an Association of Magistrates of the Maghreb Region. They will discuss draft statutes in the fall and also hold a follow-up meeting in Scandinavia at the International Judges Association.

Asia

Initiative Shares “Lessons Learned” on Domestic Violence and Gender in China

ABA Commission on Domestic Violence Director Robin Runge exchanges views with China’s Supreme People’s Court Vice President Wan Exiang on the role of the bar in working with judges and courts to promote reform addressing gender bias in the law during a meeting at the Court on July 24, 2007, in Beijing.

In July 2007, Robin Runge, Director of the ABA Commission on Domestic Violence, traveled to China to participate in Rule of Law Initiative programs to share lessons learned and advise Chinese courts and advocates on improving judicial and community responses to domestic violence. 

The People’s Republic of China Supreme People’s Court (SPC), as part of a larger effort to reexamine the role of gender in adjudicating rights and settling disputes under law, is examining the need to issue judicial guidance to lower court judges in the handling of divorce and custody cases that involve domestic violence.  During the ABA delegation’s visit to the Supreme People’s Court on July 24, Ms. Runge exchanged views with SPC Vice President Wan Exiang on the role of the bar in working with judges and courts to promote reform to address gender bias in the courts, and to arrange court proceedings so that victims are kept safe from their batterers and can exercise their legal rights. 

A July 29–30 Symposium on Gender Perspectives on Marriage and Family Cases, supported by ABA, shared best practices and explored the rationales for rules governing the use of mediation, and the assessment of evidence, in cases involving domestic violence.  The SPC’s expected guidance on these issues is aimed at addressing abuses of power or other inappropriate pressure applied by lower courts in the widespread promotion of mediation without protections for domestic violence survivors, and in the current failure to acknowledge relevant evidence of domestic violence in cases of custody or division of marital property.

Ms. Runge also shared lessons learned with other legal advocates in a separate workshop on July 26–27 to improve local pilot projects around China to provide a coordinated community response to survivors of domestic violence.  Organizers of these pilot projects, being implemented in seven communities around China, were convened by the Rule of Law Initiative and China’s Network for Combating Domestic Violence to share experience in the pilot communities and the United States.  Participants then discussed ways to improve the projects by incorporating needs assessments from the perspective of victims in designing coordinated service strategies, by considering different models of service delivery, and brainstorming ways to access and develop Network resources to meet these needs, including the training of trainers in the pilot communities.  This meeting of the far-flung pilot projects marks a turning point in which the organizers have become connected to a broader network and have developed plans to take their projects to the next level in impact and effectiveness.

For more information, please contact Hyeon-Ju Rho at rhoh@staff.abanet.org.

Rule of Law Initiative Conducts U.S.–China Environmental Exchange

Participants in the Initiative’s U.S.–China Environmental Exchange Project meet with U.S. EPA officials in Washington, DC before beginning month-long periods of residency at American federal and state environmental protection agencies and NGOs in June and July 2007.

From the moment they stepped off the plane on June 17, 2007, in Washington, DC, Chinese environmental officials and advocates marveled at the clear air and blue skies overhead.  “I knew that the U.S. had good environmental protection, but I didn’t realize just how far China still has to go,” said Xi’an Environmental Protection Bureau (EPB) official John Qi. 

Director Qi and his nine colleagues were in the United States to participate in the Rule of Law Initiative’s Exchange Project to Increase Citizen Participation, Accountability, & Transparency in Environmental Decision-Making in China, co-sponsored by China’s State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA).  The participants included two SEPA officials, five provincial and municipal EPB officials from Xi’an, Shenyang, Wuhan, and Guizhou, one NGO leader from Chongqing, one judge on the Supreme People’s Court, and one environmental lawyer from Beijing. 

The core of the exchange program consisted of month-long periods of residency during June and July 2007 in American environmental agencies and NGOs. Exchange participants worked alongside their American counterparts in daily planning and implementation of activities to promote civic participation, information transparency, and environmental good governance.  Following an orientation in DC where the delegation met with U.S. government agencies, think tanks, and civil society groups, the participants dispersed to organizations around the country, including U.S. EPA Region 5 in Chicago and Madison, U.S. EPA Region 9 in San Francisco, the California EPA, the California Energy Commission, the Sierra Club, and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) in DC and New York.  

As part of their periods in residency, two exchange participants, Tang Shaohua of Wuhan EPB and Wu Dengming of Chongqing Green Volunteers, took part in the California Environment Dialogue.  “What left a deep impression,” said Director Tang, “was that government officials, NGO leaders, and businesspeople all participated as equals in the dialogue.”  He and Mr. Wu both returned to China with plans to create similar dialogues around environmental issues in their cities, which are located along China’s Yangtze River.

“If the public respects the law, and the government respects the law, then business will come to respect the law as well,” said Mr. Wu. 

The expansive and important role of civil society participation in environmental protection in the U.S. left a similarly strong impression on other participants.  Peng Bin of Guizhou Provincial EPB, who was in residency at EPA region 5, was particularly struck by the significant role of environmental lawyers, both inside and outside of government.  Chinese attorney Xia Jun, who was in residence at NRDC, was impressed by the many facets of American environmental lawyers’ work, including litigation, lobbying and public education.  Mr. Xia has already reached an agreement with Mr. Wu on the Chongqing environmental NGO to engage in deeper collaboration between his law firm and the NGO back in China.

Participants’ initial impressions that the U.S. environment was already “so well protected that there wasn’t much more environmental protection work to do” was gradually replaced by a nuanced understanding of the nature and focus of current American environmental protection efforts.  As Director Qi reflected on discussions with EPA officials about problems like hazardous waste clean-up and the dangers of substances leaching into the groundwater, he realized the extent to which American environmental officials are paying attention to the impacts on citizens’ health.  Moreover, the interaction between the EPA and NGOs, which he characterized as, “friendly, but mutually supervising each other; supporting and helping environmental protection” through greater public participation, was also was a novel and motivational experience.  “From what we saw at the U.S. EPA,” Mr. Qi concluded, “I can see what China’s environmental protection agencies will need to do in the future.”

The participants kept on-line journals and photos of their experiences in the U.S., which are available at http://www.chinaeol.net/zmhj/default_en.asp (English translations) and http://www.chinaeol.net/zmhj/xwdt.htm (Chinese). They will submit a collective report to China’s SEPA leaders on their observations and recommendations from the exchange, and the next issue of China’s World Environment magazine will feature their stories and case studies on public participation in environmental protection in the United States.  The next phase of the exchange project will take place in China, as representatives from the American host organizations will spend periods in residence at their counterpart Chinese environmental organizations, and all participants will serve as trainers in a Rule of Law Initative & SEPA-organized national workshop on implementing environmental public participation.

For more information, please contact Allison Moore at < moorea@staff.abanet.org >.

Africa

ABA ROLI Leads Effort to Combat Human Trafficking in Nigeria

Participants dress down for a bit of sight-seeing in Calabar. (July 4, 2007)

ABA ROLI, in collaboration with Nigeria’s National Agency for the Prohibition of Traffic in Persons (NAPTIP) and the National Judicial Institute (NJI), successfully organized and held pilot anti-trafficking capacity building workshops for high court judges and state prosecutors in Nigeria.  The first, for the southwestern states, occurred in May 2007, and another covering the southern zone concluded in July 2007.

The workshops, which assembled judges, magistrates and state counsel from the southwestern states of the country, constitute a critical component of ABA ROLI’s Criminal Law and Trafficking Program in Nigeria, the objective of which is to build the anti-TIP capacities of prosecutors, judges, police officers, and immigration officers through trainings and skill-building workshops.

The trainings took place in the cities of Ijebu-ode and Calabar, and twenty Judges along with nine state prosecutors were trained by resource persons from ABA ROLI, NAPTIP, NJI, and the Nigerian Law School.

The training program included presentations on:

• The International Legal Regime of Trafficking in Persons
• The Features and Salient Penal Provisions of the Anti-Human Trafficking-in-Persons Legislation of 2003
• The Transnational Nature of the Offense of Trafficking in Persons and the Jurisdiction of Nigerian courts
• The Management of Trafficking-in-Persons cases, from Arrest through Prosecution to Rehabilitation.
• Adjudicating TIP cases: Jurisdiction, Procedure and Sentencing issues.

The objectives of the training workshops were as follows:

1. To sensitize prosecutors and other members of the bar as well as the bench on the menace of human trafficking in Nigeria.
2. To train prosecutors, members of the bar and the bench on current trends in human trafficking across the globe, particularly regarding to the adjudication of TIP.

At the beginning of the workshops, the participants listed their key expectations as follows:

• To gain more knowledge on the nature, elements and effects of TIP in Nigerian society.
• To foster better cooperation both among judges and between judges and prosecutors in adjudicating TIP cases.
• To gain further insight into the psyche of the victim as a witness.
• To gain better a understanding of the salient provisions of Nigeria's TIP statute.
• To be able to apply knowledge gained at the workshop in the prosecution and adjudication of TIP cases including drawing up charge sheets, taking evidence in court and sentencing.

At the conclusion of the training workshops, participants generally indicated a notable increase in their understanding of Trafficking in Persons as well as a greater appreciation of the standards expected in adjudicating TIP cases.  These conclusions were drawn from answers given in the pre-test and post- training questionnaires by the participants.

Participants also showed a greater appreciation of the provisions of the Nigerian Anti-TIP Law; the Trafficking in Persons (Prohibition) Law Enforcement and Administration Act of 2003, and its importance in the proper prosecution and adjudication of TIP cases

For further information, please contact Chizoma Opara, Staff Attorney in Nigeria (zomaopara@yahoo.com)

People in the News

Dina Mocan Earns Certificate in Women’s Human Rights

Dina Mocan, ABA ROLI’s Moldova Legal Assistant, earned a certificate in Women’s Human Rights from the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law in Sweden.  The Institute awarded the certificate to Ms. Mocan after she passed an examination on a range of human rights issues and completed all the requirements of the second phase of her participation in the February 2007 regional program on women’s rights at the Institute.  Ms. Mocan was one of 25 participants from Eastern Europe, the Balkans and Central Asia selected in a competitive process and funded entirely by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency.  For the second phase of the program, Ms. Mocan organized two gender rights trainings that the Rule of Law Initiative conducted in cooperation with Winrock International for young students in rural northern Moldova. She also wrote a gender equality “Know Your Rights” brochure that the office has widely distributed.   Ms. Mocan joined the Moldova office in 2005 as a law student intern after winning an ABA ROLI writing competition on women’s rights and since then has completed her law degree and been promoted twice. 

Research Log

Legal Analyst Headed to Ukraine for Year-Long Lectureship through Fulbright

Dr. Carson Clements, Legal Analyst for the ABA Rule of Law Initiative’s Office of Research and Program Development, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant to lecture at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy (NaUKMA) Faculty of Law in Kyiv, Ukraine during the 2007-2008 academic year, according to the United States Department of State and the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

Clements will teach various courses, including: International Business Transactions, Drafting and Negotiating International Business Documents, International Commercial Law and Arbitration, and International Law and Organizations; work with the NaUKMA Willem Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot Team; and assist with Bologna Process legal education reforms.

Clements is one of approximately 800 U.S. faculty, professionals, and students who will travel abroad through the Fulbright Scholar Program.  Established in 1946 under legislation introduced by the late Senator J. William Fulbright of Arkansas, the Program's purpose is to build mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the rest of the world.

The Fulbright Program, America's flagship international educational exchange program, is sponsored by the United States Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.  Since its inception, the Fulbright Program has exchanged approximately 273,500 people - 102,900 Americans who have studied, taught or researched abroad and 170,600 students, scholars and teachers from other countries who have engaged in similar activities in the United States.  The Program operates in over 150 countries worldwide.

For further information about the Fulbright Program or the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, please visit their website at http://exchanges.state.gov