Proposed judicial reforms ‘important step’— rights watchdog

AMMAN — Reforms of the justice system, proposed in an ad-hoc Royal committee report in February, are an “important step forward” for justice in Jordan, according to a statement released by Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Tuesday. 

The Royal Committee for Reforming the Judiciary and Enhancing the Rule of Law, established by His Majesty King Abdullah in 2016, presented its findings to the King last month, proposing changes to 13 laws and four new draft laws and regulations.

Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said that “Jordanian authorities should seize the opportunity to carry out long-awaited measures that would dramatically improve the country’s criminal justice system”. 

“Given the King’s full endorsement, the government and Parliament should move quickly to formally enact the justice system measures,” she said. 

Among the proposed changes, which the committee said should be carried out during 2017, would be guarantees that persons suspected of committing major crimes have the right to lawyers from the moment of arrest and throughout interrogation, limits on pre-trial detention, improvement of conditions in prisons and elimination of reduced sentences for the perpetrators of so-called “honour crimes”. 

The committee’s proposals also include “long-awaited changes to the penal code that would protect women from violence”, the HRW statement said, especially the current legal exception for perpetrators of sexual violence who can escape punishment if they agree to marry their victims, as well as of reduced sentences for so-called “honour crimes”, the statement said.  

The right of the state to hold suspects in pretrial detention will also be severely curtailed under the Royal committee’s proposals, being used as an “exceptional measure”, rather than the norm and only allowed under limited circumstances, the HRW statement explained. 

According to Jordan’s National Centre for Human Rights’ 2016 annual report, there were 28,437 people in pre-trial detention during 2015, a figure almost double that of  the 15,765 convicted prisoners serving judicial sentences.

While praising the proposed changes, the HRW statement also said that  “the recommendations fall short in several areas”. 

It noted that “the amendments also do not appear to apply to detentions by Jordan’s General Intelligence Directorate”, as well as not preventing “arbitrary administrative detention of up to a year by local governors”. 

The legal definition of torture in the Penal Code Article 208, HRW argued, would not be brought “into line with international standards” by the Royal committee’s proposals. 

Article 149, which criminalises “undermining the political regime or inciting opposition to it”, will also go unchanged, the HRW statement noted.