The new draft law of the Kyrgyz Republic “On the State-Guaranteed Legal Aid (SGLA)” will provide expanded access of citizens to legal aid already at the district level. This was announced at a regular meeting of the working group on the development of the draft law of the Kyrgyz Republic “On Amendments to the Law of the Kyrgyz Republic on State Guaranteed Legal Aid” (SGLA).

The working group was established on 14 May 2019 by the decision of the Committee on Constitutional Legislation, State Structure, Judicial and Legal Issues and Regulations of the Jogorku Kenesh (JK). UNDP is supporting this initiative within the project of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland and UNDP “Towards a sustainable access to justice for legal empowerment in the Kyrgyz Republic”.

Aizana Niyazalieva, member of the Bar Council of the Bar Association of the Kyrgyz Republic, Chairperson of the Chui Province Bar Association, noted that every citizen who is not able to pay for the lawyer’s services (and whose monthly income does not exceed 8,750 KGS) has the right to such assistance. “A citizen applies to the SGLA center, its coordinator finds a lawyer, and the lawyer provides assistance. At the meeting of the working group, I represent the Bar Association. My goal is to ensure the draft law takes into account the interests of both citizens and lawyers who represent the interests of citizens before the state. The Bar Association as a civil society institution primarily represents the interests of citizens. In addition, according to the Constitution, everyone has the right to receive qualified legal assistance, and this is implemented by lawyers under the Law of the Kyrgyz Republic on State Guaranteed Legal Aid”, she said.

As stated by Kamila Beishembek kyzy, the working group member and employee of the department of Jogorku Kenesh Committee on Constitutional Legislation, State Structure, Judicial and Legal Issues and Regulations, at the moment, the work is underway at the stage of package draft laws of the SGLA law, which was posted on the JK website in March 2020 and went through public hearings. “After the package draft laws are developed, we plan to submit them for the deputies’ consideration, who will further initiate the main SGLA law and package draft laws. The new draft law has expanded the scope of persons and will include, for example, victims of violence and military personnel”, Beishembek kyzy said.

The draft law has been sent to international experts for examination, and received positive assessment and conclusion on full compliance with international standards.

The SGLA Law was adopted in 2016 as part of the judicial and legal reform. In 2017, SGLA Coordination Center was established under the Ministry of Justice of the Kyrgyz Republic. The current law stipulates the provision of legal aid of two types: primary aid in the form of legal advice, and secondary aid in the form of qualified assistance of lawyers to represent and protect the rights and interests of citizens at all stages of criminal, civil and administrative proceedings. State funding is provided only for the second type of legal aid.

- Over a short period of time, practice has shown that legislation norms have some gaps impeding effective implementation of the law. These are the issues regarding the implementation mechanism, determining the scope of persons to receive assistance, as well as the interaction of the SGLA system entities, in particular in the framework of criminal cases with law enforcement and judicial authorities. There is a separate issue about the mechanism for legal aid provision in civil and administrative cases, since the main emphasis has been placed on criminal cases. Based on the practice analysis, we first proposed to make amendments to this law. Since these amendments have exceeded over 50% of the law’s articles and norms, according to the law on regulatory documents, in this case, a new version of the law should be developed. Therefore, the working group decided not to make amendments and develop a new draft law with the main emphasis on the regulation of aid provision in civil and administrative matters,” the director of the SGLA Central Committee Akjol Kalbekov informed.

The legislation on state-guaranteed legal aid in criminal and civil cases is the most important legal instrument allowing vulnerable groups of the population to gain access to justice. There are various models of institutional framework in the world related to free legal aid. However, it is important to note that there are no international standards and principles on how the institutional framework should be created and organized; most importantly, the institutional framework should be able to effectively and efficiently provide state-guaranteed legal aid. In addition, given the peculiarities of the legislative system and their impact on the general state budget, as well as the need to ensure financial sustainability of state-guaranteed legal aid, it is necessary to rationally and reasonably establish a system of free legal aid using traditionally available state infrastructure and resources currently used.

The law on state-guaranteed legal aid traditionally covers the following two important aspects, namely: (i) provision of legal information and legal services to citizens by free legal aid centers (so-called primary free legal aid) and (ii) assistance during legal proceedings, judicial and procedural assistance and representation by lawyers (so-called secondary free legal aid). Only secondary legal aid is funded by the state, and lawyers provide primary legal aid through free legal aid centers on a voluntary basis.

After the adoption and implementation of the Law of the Kyrgyz Republic on State-Guaranteed Legal Aid, the analysis has shown that most clients of state-guaranteed legal aid can solve their problems within the primary free legal aid system, that is, with the help of proper legal advice and consultation. This means that if this system works properly, if qualified lawyers at free legal aid centers and other organizations provide quality advice, if interactive websites are created with comprehensive and easily assessable and understandable information, documents and forms to be completed in everyday life, these will ensure fewer clients to receive secondary free legal aid, so less budget funds will be spent on this expensive type of state-guaranteed legal aid. For this reason, it is important to ensure the sustainability (institutionalization) of the primary state guaranteed legal aid provision so that these front line service providers can adequately respond to the needs of vulnerable populations and, therefore, serve as an important filter for secondary state guaranteed legal aid.

“According to the law, each state agency, within the limits of its functions, is obliged to provide legal advice, including local authorities. This is stated in their sector laws. But de facto, this work is not done due to objective and subjective reasons. The creation of such centers at the district level will ensure interaction, monitoring of the system; within the system, we will develop effective mechanisms for capacity-building of those providing such assistance”, explained Akjol Kalbekov. “There is a problem of providing legal aid in remote regions of the country. The task of our center will be to cover the entire country, especially the remote areas, with access to legal aid. Currently, our coordinators work only at the level of provinces, it is physically impossible to provide assistance to everyone. Basically, they are engaged in providing secondary legal assistance - this is the appointment and consideration of the lawyer's report, payment of fees. And the primary legal aid is not provided at the proper level.”