Kyrgyzstan: almost 45% of defendants are unemployed
A member of the ANGO Coalition “Human Rights Advocacy Center” published the data from the monitoring of court hearings to verify the legality and justification of detention and the application of a preventive measure.
The purpose of the study was to determine the degree of compliance of the practice of investigating judges of the Kyrgyz Republic in exercising judicial control over the legality and justification of detention and the application of a preventive measure to the principles of Habeas corpus and international standards of a fair trial.
The objects of monitoring were the court sessions of the investigating judges to check the legality and validity of the detention and the application of the preventive measure by the court.
In total, the monitoring participants attended 520 court sessions in the cities of Bishkek, Tokmok, Talas, Jalal-Abad, Osh, Batken, Kadamjai, Naryn and Karakol, as well as in the villages of Sokuluk, Suzak, Ak-Suu and Aravan.
The study revealed that in most cases, the persons, involved in criminal cases in Kyrgyzstan, were Kyrgyz (76%) unemployed (44.2%) or temporarily employed (32.7%). Moreover, the offenses are classified as crimes in most cases (almost 97%).
During the monitoring, special attention was paid to the observance of the following international standards of fair trial.
With regard to the observance of the principle of openness and publicity of courts, it was found that access to meetings, taking into account the pandemic, was limited in 88.7% of cases. However, for the relatives of the defendants, it was limited only in 22.8% of cases.
The researchers found that the correspondence of the time of actual detention to the time of delivery to the court wasn’t found out by the judges in 87.7% of cases.
During the hearings, in 52.3% of cases, the judges didn’t specify whether the defendants had been explained the right not to testify against themselves. In 46.7% of cases, there was no judicial review of the observance of the right to have a lawyer at the time of actual detention. Also, in a third of the cases, the judges didn’t find out whether the defendant was granted the right to an effective call.
The monitoring participants also found out that in Kyrgyzstan there is a problem with the observance of the presumption of innocence, because in 76.5% of cases the suspects are brought to court in handcuffs and in almost 29% of cases the handcuffs are not removed even in the court room.
The researchers also established how the right to provide the translation is carried out in Kyrgyz courts.
In 71.9% of cases, the courts are in the state language, the rest of the sessions are held in the official language. At the same time, there was no case when the need for an interpreter was declared. Translation was carried out either by the judges themselves or by prosecutors. Moreover, the observers noted that in 2 cases, when the translation from the Kyrgyz language into Russian was done by investigating judges, the quality of translation could be characterized as unqualified and incomplete.
As for the right to a public, reasoned court decision, it was established that in 100% of cases, the court decision was announced publicly, in the presence of the process’ participants and some of those who were allowed to the court sessions. In 98.5% of cases, the investigating judges, referring to the suspects, found out whether they understood the court decision. In 97.5% of cases, the investigating judges explained to the parties to the criminal process the right and procedure for appealing against the court decision.
Based on the monitoring results, the recommendations were developed to the Supreme Court and the Higher School of Justice under the Supreme Court of the Kyrgyz Republic, as well as to investigating judges. It was recommended to develop interim guidelines on measures to prevent transmission of infection during pandemics in courts and judicial authorities, as well as a manual for the press services of courts on accurate, complete, objective coverage of the activities of the judicial system during the state of emergency and quarantine.
In addition, the courts were recommended, in order to resolve the issue of detention, in each specific case, to check the validity of the suspicion of the person’s involvement in the crime on the basis of real evidence presented in court. And in cases, when the detention was carried out by other persons not authorized to do it, these persons must also be brought for questioning by the investigating judge to testify about the time and circumstances of the detention.
