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Roundtable Meeting of Chief Justices and Ministers of Justice : Country Statements
Speech by Mr. Jugnee Amarsanaa, Minister of Justice and MongoliaHonorable Chief Justices and Ministers of Justices, Ladies and Gentlemen, I would like, first of all, to take this opportunity to thank the Asian Development Bank for its efforts and cooperation in bringing this important event into fruition. It is a distinct privilege and honor for me to take the floor to present a brief introductory summary about legal and judicial reform in Mongolia. As you are aware, the state which existed in Mongolia from 1921 to 1990 laid some foundations for today's democratic social structures, but it also left some negative distortions in almost all spheres of Mongolian social life. Mongolia's special features, historic opportunities, interests, and traditions of statehood and human rights were not properly represented in the Constitutions of 1921, 1940, and 1960. Furthermore, important sections of these Constitutions were violated by the monopolistic Mongolian Peoples Revolutionary Party leaders' resolutions and instructions. In 1989 and 1990, Mongolia went through a national democratic revolution, the objectives of which were to overthrow totalitarianism and establish both a government and social reforms that were based on democratic principles. The success of these efforts required us to prepare a new Constitution for the country. Through the combined efforts of a number of statesmen, public figures, scientists and legal experts, a new Constitution that embodied democratic principles was prepared in a relatively short time. The Mongolian people discussed a draft of the fundamental law of the new State for nearly three months. Then, in a historic moment for us, after 70 days of further discussion the Parliament of Mongolia (the Peoples Ih Hural) ratified the new Constitution on the 13th of January, 1992. By enacting this new Constitution for Mongolia, our people have replaced the former social structure and established principles and foundations for reforming the Mongolian State and society that are based on democracy. We have established the principle that the country will not be ruled by someone's commands, but run as a country of laws that are equally binding on every person. That is why we are in the process of extensively revising our legal system. Since the adoption of the Constitution, we have enacted many laws to regulate social relationships within a democratic framework. We have also recently established legislative, executive, and judiciary functions that operate in conformity with the theory of separation of powers, which is one of the common values of the political and legal culture of democracy. In accordance with the new laws of Mongolia, we have held elections for the Parliament and the President, and established a system of Constitutional Courts (Tsets) and a Public Prosecutor's organization. Also, judges have been appointed for all of these courts. Finally, all administrative and self-governing organizations have been established in Mongolia in accordance with the Law on Administrative and Territorial Units and Their Management. Our most demanding, difficult, and stubborn struggle in the process of reform has been in the area of economics. Article 5 of the Constitution of Mongolia states: "Mongolia shall have an economy based on different forms of property which takes into account universal trends of world economic development and national specifics. The State recognizes all forms of both public and private property and shall protect the rights of the owner by law." This article of the Constitution sets forth the essence of what we are trying to accomplish, as well as the legal basis for the implementation of our reforms. At the moment, we believe our Government cannot act in the same manner as nearly as the Governments of countries with well-developed market economies because we have a transition economy that is experiencing many difficulties. Since the new government took office in the middle of 1996, it has been implementing wide-ranging reforms that are designed both to overcome the current economic crisis and to accelerate Mongolia's transition to a market-based economy. As the result of measures taken by the last two Governments to achieve the country's transition to a market-based economy, observable progress has taken place. The former Government completed the first stage by establishing programs and systems for privatization and the liberalization of prices, exchange rates and trade policies. The former Government also established new systems of taxation, stock markets, social insurance and health care. Thus, since 1993 Mongolia has succeeded in reducing inflation, raising the Gross Domestic Production and foreign currency reserves, and achieving a positive balance of exports and imports. These achievements were greatly aided by favorable foreign assistance, particularly the support of international financial organizations and donor countries to Mongolia. However, the economic crisis still exists in Mongolia, and we have not yet established a stable foundation for sustained economic growth. In order to establish a still more favorable environment for foreign investors, we must further simplify our system of formation, registration, and approval of business entities in conformity with international standards and further upgrade the professional skills of staff responsible for implementing our foreign investment policies. Accordingly, the Parliament has recently enacted the Minerals Law specifically designed to attract foreign investors in the mining industry, because that industry is of fundamental importance to our country's economy. This new law provides many incentives for foreign investment, the spread of new technologies, the further development of infrastructure, and so forth. Mongolia has now enacted a number of these impressive laws, the Minerals law is just one of them. One of the most important elements in the reform of the State's institutional and legal framework has been modifying the judiciary system of Mongolia to conform to the new Constitution. To strengthen the independence of judges, the courts and their operations, we have enacted new laws governing the judiciary, prosecutor's office, civil procedures, advocacy, notaries, the execution of judgments, and amendments to the Code of Criminal Procedure. We still have a pressing need to further reform the organization and operation of the judiciary system in accordance with Constitutional principles. To guarantee human rights and freedom, the Mongolian State needs to establish an Administrative Court which will settle petitions regarding alleged illegal actions and resolutions by State organizations and their officials, to further revise regulations which now unduly limit human rights and freedom, and to further strengthen the courts by providing them skilled staff and lifting their responsibilities. We consider the training and retraining of legal professional cadres and the updating and strengthening of the Mongolian legal system to be the key conditions for successful implementation of legal reform in Mongolia. Therefore, we have emphasized the training of legal professional cadres in the legal reform program that has been submitted to the Parliament for its ratification. Under this proposal, funding of the teaching cadres of the Law Institute of the State University of Mongolia will be improved. Further, this institute will be extended to an independent institute under measures to develop the legal training system of Mongolia. The Government of Mongolia will also strengthen the training and re-training of legal professional cadres in the Police Institute and the Institute of Administration and Management Development of Mongolia, and attend to their structural development, as well. In addition, Mongolian Law Institutes will organize correspondence and evening courses for graduates of law colleges to upgrade their qualifications. The Government of Mongolia will support the establishment of both state-owned and private Law Institutes. If they meet specific requirements, the State central administrative institute responsible for legal policy will approve them and monitor their enrollment of new students, quality, contents, and organization of their training. We will take measures to upgrade the training of our law professors and teachers in Mongolia and overseas and invite highly qualified foreign professors to help us with the task of upgrading Mongolian professors' qualifications. The curriculum of all Mongolian institutes and colleges will be strengthened to meet the international standards of developed countries within a few years. With the assistance of the Asian Development Bank, we are preparing to establish an independent Re-training Center for lawyers in 1998. The legislation enacted by the Mongolian Parliament over the past few years was intended to deepen the reforms of 1992 and spread them to all segments of the society. In particular they were intended to achieve the following impacts: to create the necessary conditions for the country's transition to a market economy; to guarantee citizens' rights to property; to regulate property relations effectively; to develop systems of social insurance, care, and protection; and to spread the reform process to legal relations. During its autumn session, the Mongolian Parliament will discuss more than 40 draft laws to regulate areas such as the economy, financial and economic transactions, and social protection, e.g. citizens' private land, land privatization, unfair competition, insolvency, commercial insurance, social sector privatization, investments, living standards, 5 days of work per week, governmental structures and activities, public media and media freedom. We believe it is vital that these legal reforms be enacted and implemented. It is also vital that we avoid any tendency to discuss and enact laws that protect the interests of a single organization or sector. Also it is very important that we conduct the legal reform program as a matter of State policy in order to ensure this reform is applied steadily and systematically. To this end, it is the Ministry of Justice that has developed this legal reform program and submitted it to the Parliament. Approval of this program will so focus the operations and actions of State organizations and their officials to achieve our supreme objective of developing a humane, civil, democratic society in the country. Approval will also lay down a firm legal basis for Mongolia's further political, social, and economic development. In addition to the legal reform program that I have been discussing, we are designing a parallel plan of actions to implement the program and a draft of principal directions for Mongolia's legislation from 1997 to 2001. If the plan is followed, the Mongolian Government during this period will draft over 100 new laws, amend about 60 current laws and reconsider more than 20 existing laws. The legislative plan also calls for the enactment of laws which will further clarify the principles and conceptions of the Constitution. Further, the plan seeks to coordinate the revision of all previous laws as well as regulate conflicting laws, clarify unclear regulations, make amendments to laws, some regulations of which have not met the requirements of society, and eradicate gaps in our laws in order to guarantee human rights and freedom, and deepen the reform process in the political, economic, social, cultural, and intellectual spheres of social life. The Parliament recently enacted a "Law on Drafting Laws and Resolutions and their Submission to the State Ih Hural" which sets forth the rules of legislative procedure. We believe that the enactment of this law will raise the quality of draft laws and, furthermore, increase the responsibility of the Parliament, the Government, and their institutions and secretariats. As we move on with the business of this conference, I hope these meetings will be the start of a fruitful and lasting cooperation for all of us. I thank you for your courteous attention and extend my best wishes for many successes at this Conference.
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