[E] President of Vietnam Lawyers Association Nguyen Van Quyen:

On the occasion of the Spring of Giap Thin 2024, Nguoi Dua Tin (NDT) listened to the sharing from Dr. Nguyen Van Quyen - Secretary of the Party Committee, President of the Vietnam Lawyers Association about important tasks in the new year, including promoting emulation movements to achieve achievements, towards the 14th National Congress of the Vietnam Lawyers Association , term 2024-2029.

Investor: In 2023, the Vietnam Bar Association achieved many outstanding results in various fields of work. Could you please tell us about the impressive results of the Association?

Dr. Nguyen Van Quyen: Since the beginning of 2023, the world situation has changed very quickly, complicatedly and unpredictably. In the country, after more than 35 years of renovation, we have achieved great achievements of historical significance, which are an important foundation for promoting development. Although there are many difficulties and challenges, with the efforts of the entire political system, under the leadership of the Party, our country has achieved important results in many fields.

Dr. Nguyen Van Quyen - President of Vietnam Lawyers Association (Photo: Huu Thang).

In that context, right from the beginning of the year, the Party Committee, the Standing Committee, and the Central Standing Committee of the Vietnam Lawyers Association have proactively developed and implemented many programs and plans to successfully carry out the tasks set for 2023; in which general activities, specific activities and implementation time are clearly identified; regularly inspect and urge agencies and units in organizing implementation. Thanks to the focused leadership, drastic and synchronous direction of the Party Committee, the Standing Committee, and the Central Standing Committee of the Association, the Association's activities in the past year have achieved many good results, with some specific targets exceeding the set levels.

Notably, in the work of participating in policy and law making, the Lawyers Associations at all levels nationwide have organized more than 1,200 conferences, seminars, and discussions to contribute opinions to draft legal documents with more than 29,000 opinions, including important draft laws such as: Draft Law on Land (amended); Draft Law on Water Resources (amended); Draft Law on Social Insurance (amended) and drafts: Law on Road Traffic Order and Safety; Law on Identification, Law on Extradition... Along with that, the Association has organized research and built a dossier to propose the development of a Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Commercial Arbitration and sent it to agencies for opinions according to the procedure of the Law on promulgation of legal documents. In legal consultancy and legal aid work, the Association continues to implement cooperation programs with signed agencies and organizations and directly participates in legal aid at the Central Citizen Reception Headquarters and provinces and cities. The content and forms of legal consultancy and legal aid are diverse and rich. More than 105,000 cases have been consulted, compared to 86,600 cases in 2022. The work of disseminating and educating the law is also very impressive. The Association at all levels has directly organized more than 32,000 sessions for more than 8,000,000 people, while in 2022 it was only 14,000 sessions. Other professional work aspects such as: Participating in judicial reform, administrative reform, monitoring law enforcement; foreign affairs and international cooperation have also achieved positive results.

Continue to enhance the role and position of the Vietnam Bar Association.

Investor: Mr. President, on July 1, 2022, the Politburo issued Directive No. 14-CT/TW on continuing to strengthen the Party's leadership over the Vietnam Lawyers Association in the new situation. After more than a year of the Directive, could you please tell us how this important Directive is being implemented?

Dr. Nguyen Van Quyen: Directive 14 clearly affirms that the Vietnam Lawyers Association is a political-social-professional organization, operating under the leadership of the Party, managed by the State, and is a member of the Vietnam Fatherland Front. The Party and the State assign tasks to the Vietnam Lawyers Association to promote all levels of the Association and its members to actively contribute to the cause of national construction and development, building a socialist rule-of-law state of Vietnam of the people, by the people, for the people, protecting the independence, sovereignty, unity, and territorial integrity of the Fatherland. The Directive emphasizes the need to continue to strengthen the Party's leadership over the Vietnam Lawyers Association; Party committees and organizations at all levels need to thoroughly grasp and raise awareness of the position, role, and responsibility of the Vietnam Lawyers Association, continue to consolidate, improve, and build the Association increasingly strong in organization. Thereby, further promoting the role of the Association in the new situation.

Immediately after Directive 14 was issued, the Party Committee of the Vietnam Lawyers Association issued Plan No. 145-KH/DD dated September 8, 2022 to synchronously and comprehensively implement the tasks and solutions set forth by the Politburo in Directive 14. On October 12, 2022, the Lawyers Association held a National Conference to implement it. Comrade Phan Dinh Trac, Politburo member, Secretary of the Party Central Committee, Head of the Central Internal Affairs Commission, on behalf of the Politburo and the Secretariat, attended and gave instructions. Attending the conference were Comrade Tran Quoc Vuong, former Politburo member, former Standing Secretary of the Secretariat and leaders of a number of central departments, ministries and branches. Then, on May 30, 2023, the Vietnam Lawyers Association issued an Action Program outlining specific tasks and solutions to implement Directive No. 14 of the Politburo throughout the Association system.

Dr. Nguyen Van Quyen - President of Vietnam Lawyers Association (Photo: Huu Thang).

To implement the Directive, the Party Delegation of the National Assembly issued Plan No. 862 dated August 12, 2022, which includes the following contents: Research, review and propose to include in the Law and Ordinance Development Program draft laws, ordinances, and draft resolutions with provisions related to promoting the Vietnam Lawyers Association's participation in research, proposal, criticism, and recommendation for law improvement; promoting the role of the Vietnam Lawyers Association in researching, proposing the development and submission of draft laws, ordinances, and draft resolutions; promoting the role of the Vietnam Lawyers Association in participating in the examination and revision of draft laws, ordinances, and draft resolutions; promoting the role of Lawyers Associations of provinces and centrally run cities in collecting opinions on draft laws at the local level; Promoting the role of the Vietnam Lawyers Association in supervising law enforcement... The Party Committee and the Government have issued Plan No. 1829-KH/BCSĐCP dated May 4, 2023 on implementing Directive No. 14-CT/TW of the Politburo, which clearly states the specific tasks and solutions: Focus on propagating and thoroughly raising awareness of the role of the Vietnam Lawyers Association; perfecting the institution on organization and operation of the Vietnam Lawyers Association to meet the requirements of perfecting the organization and innovating, improving the quality of activities of the Vietnam Lawyers Association; attracting and promoting the role of Lawyers Associations at all levels to participate in State management activities of ministries, branches and localities; researching the transfer of implementation of public service provision in accordance with the capacity of the Vietnam Lawyers Association at all levels according to the mechanism of assigning work and allocating funds in accordance with the provisions of law.

In 2023, the Party Delegation of the Vietnam Lawyers Association organized 14 working delegations to work with Party committees and authorities of a number of localities. The results of the working sessions showed that local leaders recognized, evaluated and promoted the role of the Vietnam Lawyers Association at all levels at present. Along with that, they affirmed that they will continue to pay attention, lead, direct and create conditions for the Association at all levels to continue to promote their strengths, contributing to the socio-economic development of the locality.

Up to now, the Bar Associations of provinces and cities, Bar Associations and their affiliated units, provincial and municipal Party Committees, Party Delegations, Party Executive Committees of ministries, branches and organizations at the Central level have issued documents to implement this important Directive.

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