OSCE Centre supports judicial reform in Kazakhstan
ASTANA, 18 October 2007 - Improving criminal procedure and penitentiary legislation in Kazakhstan is the focus of an OSCE Centre conference that opened today in Astana.
"This high-level forum is indeed a good opportunity to discuss the pressing issues of criminal justice reform in Kazakhstan, especially the planned transfer of powers of arrest from the prosecutor's office to the judiciary," said Ambassador Ivar Vikki, Head of the OSCE Centre in Astana. "I urge the experts here to carefully consider this reform in light of recommendations from the OSCE's Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights."
The two-day event brings together more than 100 participants, representing all criminal justice agencies of the country, to discuss the introduction of judicial authorization of arrest and the state of penitentiary reform. The conference will adopt recommendations that will contribute to the elaboration of a new strategy to improve the functioning of the criminal justice system in Kazakhstan.
"The most important issue now is the preparation of a programmatic document, which will state the main directions and priorities for further development of the criminal justice system. The absence of clear indicators leads to a chaotic introduction of various elements stemming from different legal traditions," said Ilyas Bakhtybayev, the First Deputy General-Prosecutor of Kazakhstan.
The event was organized by the OSCE Centre, in close co-operation with the Office of the Prosecutor-General, the Internal Affairs Ministry, Penal Reform International and the Almaty-based NGO Charter for Human Rights, and follows an OSCE-supported conference held in June 2007.