• Location: an office in central Kathmandu and activities led in 5 districts
• Opening of a permanent mission: November 2010
• Team: 1 expatriate and 1 local collaborator
• Nepalese Partners: Centre to Assist and Protect Child Rights (CapCron), Legal Aid and Consultancy Centre (LACC),Forum for Protection of People Rights (PPR)
• Objective: to promote better access to justice for at-risk persons by supporting bar associations and lawyers engaged in the defense of marginalized groups, minors in conflict with the law, and torture victims.
• Financing: Belgian Ministry of Cooperation and Development

A Fragile State

Nepal is the 15^th poorest country in the world.  A peace treaty signed in November 2006 and the first free elections in April 2008 put an end to a civil war that lasted more than 10 years and had between 10,000 and 13,000 victims.  The victory of the Maoist movement and the founding of the Republic brought to the population hope for a better tomorrow.  However, the first months of the new regime rapidly revealed the presence of major challenges to the consolidation of peace and the rule of law.

Nepalese politicians had a very hard time initiating arrangements for the peace treaty, notably with the adoption of a new Constitution that responds to the needs of the majority of the population.  The inability of the main political parties to agree on a common program, and especially disagreements between the Maoists and the Army regarding the reintegration of veterans led to a series of political crises that were settled by the resignation of the Prime Minister in May 2009 and by the extension of the Constituent Assembly’s mandate until May 2011.  Currently, Nepal remains a fragile State, unable to execute the reforms needed to combat poverty, restore safety, and develop the country.

This fragility renders even more necessary the pursuit of aid for development and especially the processes of reinforcing the rule of law.  The majority of the Nepalese population barely knows their rights.  Justice remains largely dominated by informal mechanisms of conflict resolution, and discriminatory practices towards the most at-risk (inferior castes – dalits, women, and children) persist, likewise for the impunity for crimes committed during the conflict.

There are numerous challenges to justice.  Formal justice is relatively recent and barely supported by the State.  Nepal adhered to multiple international conventions, notably the Convention on the rights of children and the Convention against torture, but the application of such agreements in internal law remains deficient.  Local players, primarily lawyers and bar associations, lack the means, the knowledge, and the organization to bring quality services to at-risk populations.  The legal aid provided for by the law remains disorganized and marginal. 

January 2009 -June 2010: A Pilot Project

ASF’s pilot project helped launch a reinforcement system for the operational ability of lawyers and bar associations in five districts (Pokhara, Birâtnagar, Rupendehi, Makawanpur, and Kachampur).  Seminars and workshops led in collaboration with national partner NGOs helped bar associations develop their own programs for access to justice.  More than 6000 people living in remote regions were made aware of their rights, more than 200 systematic visits to detention facilities were organized, and the very first permanent judicial clinics in Nepal were created.

All projects were executed voluntarily by lawyers on a pro-bono base.

One important part of the projects focused on the issue of minors in trouble with the law so that local communities and authorities could be made aware of “child rights” issues and necessary specific approaches to delinquent children. 

These projects established lawyers and bar associations in these districts as essential players on the field of defending those at-risk, primarily women, children, and detainees.

Program for 2010-2012

The next three years will allow for the consolidation of results and the extension of projects in other districts, with the participation of the National Bar Association (NBA) and other partners for development.

ASF will accompany the bar associations of 5 districts with their development, the initiation and the follow-up with the strategies for access to justice.  They will develop an ensemble of tools (awareness workshops, mobile judicial clinics, detention centre visits) and work to improve services provided by judicial staff (the number of files accepted, follow-ups with files, etc.).  Each trimester, local bar associations and the NBA will work with ASF to complete quantitative and qualitative analyses of the consultations.

ASF will support, via the International Legal Network, a group of lawyers engaged in providing aid to those at-risk in order to increase their abilities in a number of matters, particularly in the defense of minors in conflict with the law, and to allow them to take more so-called emblematic files.

ASF also intends to engage in projects to support the fight against torture.

For the latest information, read our article: ASF kicks off in Nepal