The National Commission assigned to Follow-up the BICI Recommendations

عربي

Progress & Actions Taken

1720 - To make subject to review in ordinary courts all convictions and sentences rendered by the National Security Courts where fundamental principles of a fair trial, including prompt and full access to legal counsel and inadmissibility of coerced testimony, were not respected be subject to full review in the ordinary courts.

Progress & Actions

Resolutions of the National Commission

Providing the National Commission with the actions taken or to be taken in the future to implement this recommendation.

Government Response

Implementation was as follows:

Currently, a revision is on-going for all the cases that were presented before the courts of national safety at the ordinary courts to ensure the rights for fair trial.

As for the verdicts of the courts of national safety, the Supreme Judicial Council announced on January 2, 2012 the establishment of a body to review these verdicts (30 verdicts) to ensure the right of the accused for a fair trial.

Of the 30 verdicts, that include 31 accused, 13 of them carried out the verdicts and were released. The remaining 18 accused persons are still in custody. Regarding those 18, the Higher Judiciary Council decided the following:

The verdict against 6 of them will be commutated based on the time they have already served and the possibility of their release.
Charges will be dropped against defendants of freedom of expression. This led to the release of 4 defendants immediately, while the fifth are still in custody for other charges.The charges related to freedom of expression will be dropped from all their personal files.
Verdicts against 7 suspects are still standing.

Resolutions of the National Commission

To request an interim report containing the names of members of the said panel, the date of commencement of its activities, and the estimated date of completion of its activities, which shall be before mid-February, as well as the cases ruled on by National Safety Courts with conviction sentences, the cases which did not take into consideration basic principles of fair trials, and the number of cases to be referred to civil courts.

Government Response

An announcement was released about forming the commission charged with revising all verdicts that were ruled in January 2012 by three civil judges. The commission finished its work on January 25, 2012.

The Vice-President of the Higher Judiciary Council and Chief of the Court of Cassation sent a letter to the government about the results of the commission's work with regard to the implementation of the recommendation.

Relevant Legislation / Documents

Most Recent Actions Taken