Comments on Draft Law on Court Annexed Mediation

The Draft Law on Court Annexed Mediation is attracting great interest because it impacts remarkably dispute resolution at the court system in Vietnam. MP Nguyen Hung Quang and other lawyers specializing in dispute resolution of NHQuang&Associates have conducted a number of studies and recommendations to this Draft Law since 2018 with the desire to influence the good features of mediation to the Draft. On 15 May 2020, Mr. Quang was invited to make comments on the Draft Law at a seminar of the EU Justice and Legal Empowerment Programme in Viet Nam (EU JULE) with the cooperation of the Supreme People’s Court, United Nations Development Program and European Union. The seminar was chaired by Deputy Chief Justice of the Supreme People’s Court.

Presentation of Mr. Quang at this seminar focused on following issues:

1. Ensuring court annexed mediation of this Draft do not exclude mediation prescribed in other legislation. This principle should be dominated consistently in all the provisions of the Draft;

2. Ensuring important principles of mediation, such as confidentiality, freedom to choose the mediation method, mediator, impartiality, objectivity, independence, flexibility etc. associated with the integrity of the court system;

3. The mechanism of mediation at courts must ensure the access to justice of disadvantaged groups, especially ethnic minority people;

4. Roles of judges and courts in the court annexed mediation.

The comments in Vietnamese is uploaded on blog VnLawFind at Dispute Resolution.