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E.U. Supports Establishment Of Courts Of Appeal In Turkey |
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Written by turkishpress
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Wednesday, 01 February 2006 07:08 |
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Courts of appeal will be established in Turkey within the scope of a EU-funded project and in cooperation with Turkish Justice Ministry, the Council for the Judiciary in the Netherlands and Swedish National Courts Administration, it was reported on Tuesday.
Official inauguration of the ''twinning project'' advocating the foundation of courts of appeal was held in Ankara. Turkish Justice Minister Cemil Cicek; A.H. van Delden, Chairman of the Council for the Judiciary and the leader of the project; Dutch Ambassador in Ankara Marcel Kurpershoek; and Michael Vogele, the first Secretary of the European Commission Delegation to Turkey, responsible for Financial Co-operation, Institution Building & Civil Society Delegation of the European Commission to Turkey attended the inauguration.
Taking the floor at the opening ceremony, Delden said the Netherlands was pleased to help Turkey in founding courts of appeal and cooperating with Sweden which has a great experience.
Delden underlined that the judiciary system should be improved in the EU membership process and noted that he believed reform process in Turkey would be maintained not because foreign world wants this but because Turkish people deserved this.
Dutch Ambassador Kurpershoek said the project would contribute to development of bilateral relations between Turkey and the Netherlands.
Vogele, who delivered a speech on behalf of Hansjorg Kretschmer, the representative of the European Union (EU) Commission in Turkey, said the EU was happy to advocate such a project and pointed to the importance of reforms in judiciary system within the framework of the political criteria in EU membership process.
-TARGETS OF THE PROJECT-
Delegation of the European Commission to Turkey said the initiative in question targets speeding up jurisdiction system and effectiveness, as well as protecting the right to fair trial in Turkey.
In this regard, the EU will support the Turkish Ministry of Justice in their decision to reintroduce intermediate courts of appeal between the first instance courts and the single court of last instance (Court of Cassation) based on a partnership between the Turkish Ministry of Justice, the Netherlands Council of Judiciary and Swedish National Courts Administration. This initiative will not only increase the speed and efficiency of the judiciary, but will also be an important step forward in ensuring the right to a fair trial. At the same time, the establishment of courts of appeal will relieve the Court of Cassation from its excessive workload and allow it to concentrate on unifying and clarifying Turkish case law. A reduced number of decisions by the Court of Cassation will also contribute to giving the decisions of this last instance an even more pervasive force than today.
The partnership will be implemented through a ''twinning project'', an instrument of the European Commission to reinforce the administrative capacity in the Candidate Countries. The Twinning program, designed in 1998 to prepare the Candidate Countries for accession, relies on an administrative partnership between a Candidate Country and a Member State on the basis of which long-, medium- and short-term experts from Member States are seconded to the Candidate Countries' administrations.
The implementation of the Establishment of Courts of Appeal covenant now concluded between the three partner administrations (Turkey, the Netherlands and Sweden) and endorsed on 20 January 2006, will be financed with some ?1.4 million from the European Community budget. The main long-term expert from the Netherlands administration, called Resident Twinning Advisor (RTA), will be hosted in the Turkish Ministry for up to 18 months to help plan, establish and implement an efficient Courts of Appeal system in Turkey.
The fundamental aims and objectives of the project will be to create and deliver training programs for future judges, prosecutors and auxiliary staff, in order to ensure efficient and unified implementation of the legislation on the new appellate system in the Turkish judiciary in line with the standards and practices of EU Member States. Thus, the project will provide comprehensive training to 1,000 judges and prosecutors and 1,200 auxiliary personnel appointed to the Appeal Courts. Furthermore, 3,000 handbooks on civil procedure, 6,000 on criminal procedure and 2,000 on case-flow management for auxiliary personnel will be prepared and disseminated over the course of the project.
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