A new law on advocacy is needed - Fuad Agayev

Baku / 30.11.17 / Turan: In Azerbaijan, there is a need to adopt a new law "On the Bar and Advocacy", said in the interview to the program Cətin sual (Difficult issue) of Turan agency the well-known Azerbaijani lawyer, one of the authors of the text of the Constitutional Act on State Independence of Azerbaijan Fuad Agayev. He noted that the current law was adopted without public discussions and was drawn up by the presidium of the bar association and in fact its head.

"Representatives of the legal community were deprived of the opportunity to amend the text of the bill. This document is a normative act, far from legislative machinery. It is too late to correct the law with latency, especially in such a form as is being done now. The new law should be developed with the involvement of representatives of the legal community," he said.

Touching upon the latest changes in the law on advocacy, Agayev said that in fact the institution of representation in the courts has not been liquidated. However, this institution is brought into a state far from the essence of representation.

In the days of the USSR, everyone could be the defender of the accused even in criminal cases. Therefore, participation as representatives of lawyers was quite effective. Sometimes they were more effective than even some lawyers.

The new rules will have a negative impact not only on the protection of the opposition, but also on all other citizens, since the number of lawyers is very small. According to the number of lawyers per capita, Azerbaijan ranks last in Europe. Azerbaijan is an outsider not only in numbers, but also in terms of literacy, legal skills of lawyers.

Advocacy must be seriously reformed, and the number of defenders is increased from the current 900 to at least 2000. In addition, it is necessary to stop the negative trend of excluding lawyers from the College on far-fetched proposals.

The cases of persons who filed unreasonable complaints against lawyers should be submitted to the Judicial-Legal Council. If all of the above is not, then wait for positive changes are not worth it, believes lawyer Agaev.

* By the initiative of the Supreme Court on October 31, the Milli Mejlis amended the law on the legal profession, the civil procedure and administrative procedural codes. The day before, the head of state approved these changes, which limited the institution of representation.

From now on, individuals in the courts for civil and administrative cases can only be represented by professional lawyers - members of the Bar Association. There can not be other representatives, except for close relatives.

Legal persons in civil and administrative matters can be represented by their staff members. The innovations come into force on January 1, 2018. -03B06-