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The recent Access to Justice workshop held in Oslo was the first event of its kind organized and hosted by the UNDP Oslo Governance Centre.
38 UNDP officers representing 30 Country Offices, regional programmes and SURFs were among the 56 participants who attended. The meeting aimed to build knowledge of and share UNDP's experience in the area of Access to Justice. This area of the democratic governance practice is the fastest growing and the service line most highly subscribed to in submissions to the UNDP Democratic Governance Trust Fund - 42%. In addition to UNDP staff, participants included DFID's Senior Justice Advisor, the Director of the Commonwealth Judicial Education Institute, representatives from the International Legal Resource Center (UNDP-ABA), the Spanish Centre for Research in Law and Economics, and the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Discussion focused on increasing Access to Justice for the Poor by reviewing the links between poverty, human rights and justice in programme and policy.
Among the topics included were legal aid, alternative dispute resolution, traditional justice systems and civic participation in justice reform. Examples of legal aid from South Africa and India, traditional justice in Rwanda, cultural barriers to access in Guatemala and civic participation in prison reform in Mozambique illustrate the range of case studies reviewed. Modules focused on approaches and tools to address the challenges in implementation, monitoring and evaluation of access to justice for the poor and justice sector reform. During the discourse participants drew on the experience of leading experts in the field from partner organizations, as well as within UNDP.
The event constituted a fundamental building block in the development of the democratic governance practice, gathering together into a live knowledge network the rapidly growing community of justice practitioners. Access to justice is playing an increasingly important role in developing countries' governance reforms supported by key international partners. The meeting established the agenda for UNDP in this field, identifying knowledge development priorities, mapping the capacities of its practitioners and agreeing on next steps. The new UNDP Oslo Governance Center has a leading role in pushing forward UNDP's and the broader development community's understanding of the challenges, the search for solutions, and the codification of knowledge in the field.
A key agenda item was drawing the knowledge of participants into the development of a policy note to guide UNDP's interventions in access to justice.
During the workshop, the celebration of the opening of the UNDP Oslo
Governance Centre took place at the Nobel Institute. Minister Hilde
Johnson declared the Center officially opened and reaffirmed Norway's strong commitment to UNDP's policy reform process and its democratic governance mission. Nobel laureate and East Timorese Foreign Minister (and transitional Government Minister) Jose Ramos Horta gave the keynote speech. Responding to his address was Jonas Støre, the special representative of Gro Harlem Bruntland, WHO Director General. UNDP officials present included Carlos Lopes, Gita Welch, Poul Grosen and Rajesh Choudree, the acting Coordinator of the Oslo Centre.
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