Legislative of the National Council for Human Rights holds a panel discussion entitled "Fair Criminal Trial"

The Legislative Committee of the National Council for Human Rights (NCHR), in cooperation with the European Union (EU) as one of the donor partners, held a panel discussion entitled "Fair Criminal Trial" at the headquarters of NCHR. The panel discussion dealt with a number of important issues related to guarantees for the application of fair criminal trial, with the aim of producing joint national and human rights results.

Mr. Essam Shiha (member of NCHR and Secretary of the Legislative Committee of NCHR) inaurgurated the proceedings of that panel discussion with a speech during which he emphasized the keenness of NCHR to engage with legislation closely related to human rights and the desire of NCHR to provide a vision on the legislation under review in Parliament, which is at the heart of The work and competence of the Legislative Committee and the organization of this panel discussion comes within the same framework, where the constitution guarantees every person the right to a fair criminal trial, where the actual protection of all human rights depends to a large extent on the means that are actually available at all times with the aim of reaching a fair trial, which must evaluate justice equitable.

Ambassador / Moshira Khattab, President of NCHR mentioned that achieving a fair criminal trial requires a series of interventions, and that NCHR will allocate a session to discuss each of them, as it needs a vision, and in order to achieve that vision, there must be an agreement between the stakeholders. She also indicated the need to look at the punitive philosophy and its purpose, given that the goal should be to prevent the causes of crime and to rehabilitate and integrate those who violated the law. .

A group of law experts, university professors, a number of senators and representatives, representatives of the Bar Association, judicial bodies and civil society participated in the panel discussion, as well as researchers from the technical secretariat of NCHR.

The discussions witnessed an active interaction from all participants. The topics of the seminar were dealt with through three main sessions that focused on:

- Human rights in the stage of evidence collection and investigation, including the problems of pretrial detention and alternatives.

- The trial stage, during which the importance of public hearings, fair trial guarantees, and reliance on available technological alternatives were discussed.

- Alternatives to pre-trial detention in terms of the problems of application and the proposed alternatives

The participants concluded a number of relevant outputs and recommendations, which will be worked on during the coming period to be presented to Parliament to be considered during work on amending the provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure.

The panel discussion came within the framework of the permanent and continuous work of NCHR with all partners and actors with the aim of promoting the human rights process and achieving the objectives of the National Strategy for Human Rights and what it includes of work on the legislative track by building on the existing legislative momentum with the aim of working to achieve consistency between national legislation and international conventions and principles contained in the constitution, and an affirmation of the keenness of NCHR to maintain constant communication between it and all active partners to advance cooperation and permanent coordination to achieve this goal.