Tashkent, Uzbekistan, hosted the 12th Meeting of Supreme Court Chief Justices from the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation [SCO] member states on 25-27 October 2017. Participants included India's Ambassador to Uzbekistan Vinod Kumar, Supreme Court Chief Justice of Kazakhstan Kairat Mami, Deputy Chief Justice of the Supreme People's Court of China Du Wanhua, Supreme Court Chief Justice of Kyrgyzstan Ainash Tokbayeva, senior judge at the Supreme Court of Pakistan Gulzar Ahmed, Supreme Court Chief Justice of Russia Vyacheslav Lebedev, Supreme Court Chief Justice of Tajikistan Shermukhammad Shokhiyen, Supreme Court Chief Justice of Uzbekistan Kozimdzhan Kamilov, SCO Deputy Secretary-General Sabyr Imandosov and Deputy Director of the Executive Committee of the SCO Regional Anti-Terrorist Organisation Akhat Mukashev.
The delegation representing Uzbekistan chaired the meeting. Participants in the meeting that can be described as friendly and businesslike, in the atmosphere of mutual understanding and trust, discussed the pressing issues of administering justice that are of mutual interest, as well as prospects for further cooperation between judicial bodies in various fields of law.
The participants discussed ways to improve laws on investment disputes and further efforts to boost the effectiveness of cooperation between the SCO member states on legal assistance in civil and criminal cases and in combating the recruitment of young people by various terrorist and radical structures to involve them in their activities in SCO countries.
Participants praised the democratic legal reform that is being carried out in Uzbekistan in keeping with the Action Strategy for Five Priority Areas of the Development of Uzbekistan in 2017-2021 and the Uzbekistan President's two executive orders, On Measures to Continue the Legal Reform and Provide Stronger Guarantees of Reliable Protection of Citizens' Rights and Freedoms and On Measures to Radically Improve the Structure of Uzbekistan's Judicial System and Boost Its Effectiveness, both of which aim to ensure the supremacy of law, uphold the law in the country and upgrade the reliable legal protection of the rights, freedoms and legitimate interests of citizens and businesses.
Based on their mutual understanding of how to develop the judicial systems in the SCO member states and their commitment to the SCO's principles, ideas and objectives and understanding that the Shanghai spirit is a unique driver of the SCO's successful performance and an important guideline on how to develop inter-state relations and counter global challenges and threats, the supreme court chief justices of the SCO member states make a statement as follows:
1. Cooperation between the supreme courts in the SCO member states develops and improves on the principles of mutual trust, friendship, neighbourliness, stability and mutual understanding, as well as of ensuring peace and security in the region in keeping with the SCO Charter, the Agreement on Long-Term Neighbourliness, Friendship and Cooperation Between the SCO Member States, the SCO Development Strategy Until 2025 and the SCO Astana Declaration of 9 June 2017.
2. Practical cooperation between the supreme courts in the SCO member states facilitates further improvement of joint efforts to protect citizens' rights and freedoms, enhance justice, law and order and create conditions conducive to carrying out in-depth judicial and legal reforms.
3. The supreme courts in the SCO member states stress the importance of providing stronger guarantees of rights and freedoms for citizens and the need to create conditions to implement in full the principle of the inviolability of citizens' rights and freedoms, which are enshrined in the constitutions, and note that it will be appropriate to expand the judicial procedure for taking procedural compulsion measures and improve investment protection mechanisms in order to ensure the implementation of generally accepted principles and norms of international law regarding the protection of citizens' rights and freedoms.
4. In a bid to further develop their friendly relations in areas of mutual interest, the Supreme Courts in the SCO member countries remain committed to strengthening cooperation, with a focus on work to organise and hold joint conferences and educational events and share experience.
5. Participants in the meeting will continue to step up effective cooperation and seek to strengthen security and stability and to ensure sustainable development across the SCO.
6. The participant of the meeting believe it necessary to improve cooperation with international and regional organisations, countries which have observer status and partners engaged in a dialogue with the SCO, as well as other countries in order to put in place conditions conducive to expanding cooperation on legal assistance in trying civil and criminal cases.
The heads of the delegations said that the meeting was organised to high standards and thanked the Uzbek party for their warm reception.
The next, 13th Meeting of the SCO Supreme Court Chief Justices will be held in Beijing, China, in 2018.
The statement is executed in Tashkent on 25 October 2017 in one original copy in Russian and Chinese, with both texts being equally valid.