Strengthening the Rule of Law and the Reform of Criminal Justice Institutions, Particularly in the Areas Related to the United Nations System-Wide Approach to Fighting Transnational Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking

E/RES/2012/14View PDF

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

A Resolution of the Economic and Social Council, under agenda item 14c Crime prevention and criminal justice, published in 2012.

What subjects does this mandate have?

8 subjects

Criminal Justice Drug Dependence Drug Traffic Illicit Traffic Organizational Reform Organized Crime Rule of Law Transnational Crime

What’s in this document?

16 operative paragraphs

Recommends to the General Assembly the adoption of the following draft resolution:

Calls upon relevant entities of the United Nations system to continue cooperating and coordinating their activities, within their respective mandates, to promote a more integrated approach to the provision of assistance for building capacity in the area of the rule of law and criminal justice reform and to further explore joint projects in that area;

Also calls upon relevant entities of the United Nations system to systematically take into account the various aspects of the rule of law in their programmes, projects and other activities related to crime prevention and criminal justice and to include in them all segments of the population, particularly women;

Reaffirms the importance of the United Nations crime prevention and criminal justice programme in promoting effective action to strengthen international cooperation in crime prevention and criminal justice;

Also reaffirms the importance of the work of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, in the fulfilment of its mandate on crime prevention and criminal justice, to provide to Member States, upon request and as a matter of high priority, technical assistance, advisory services and other forms of assistance and to coordinate with and complement the work of all relevant and competent United Nations bodies and offices, taking into account their respective mandates;

Strongly encourages all States to enhance bilateral, regional and international cooperation, in accordance with their domestic legislation, to counter the challenges posed by transnational organized crime and drug trafficking;

Encourages the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to incorporate relevant elements of the rule of law into its programmes and projects pertaining to crime prevention and criminal justice, in coordination, as appropriate, with other relevant United Nations entities, inter alia, the Rule of Law Coordination and Resource Group, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Department of Peacekeeping Operations;

Also encourages the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to continue to provide technical assistance and advisory services to Member States, upon request, in support of criminal justice reform and to incorporate the rule of law into such assistance, as appropriate, including within the framework of peacebuilding, peacekeeping and post-conflict reconstruction, and to promote relevant international legal instruments, including the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and the Protocols thereto,³ the United Nations Convention against Corruption⁴ and the United Nations Convention against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances of 1988,⁵ as well as relevant international anti-terrorism instruments, as appropriate, also drawing on the existing United Nations standards and norms in crime prevention and criminal justice;

³United Nations, Treaty Series, vols. 2225, 2237, 2241 and 2326, No. 39574.

⁴Ibid., vol. 2349, No. 42146.

⁵Ibid., vol. 1582, No. 27627.

Welcomes the progress made by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, within its mandate and in close consultation with Member States and regional entities, in developing and implementing an integrated programme approach to technical assistance, comprising thematic and regional programmes for its delivery;

Encourages the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to continue developing tools and training material on crime prevention and criminal justice reform, based on international standards and norms;

Reiterates its recommendation, made in its resolution 66/181 of 19 December 2011, that Member States, as appropriate to their national contexts, adopt a comprehensive and integrated approach to crime prevention and criminal justice reform, based on baseline assessments and data collection and focusing on all sectors of the justice system, and develop crime prevention policies, strategies and programmes, and its request in that resolution to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to continue to provide technical assistance, upon request, to Member States for that purpose;

Requests the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to continue to provide technical assistance, within its mandate, to Member States, upon request, in relation to the rule of law and long-term sustainable criminal justice reform;

Urges Member States providing development assistance to countries emerging from conflict to increase, where relevant, their bilateral assistance in crime prevention and criminal justice to those countries, and recommends that such assistance could, upon request, include elements relating to the rule of law;

Invites the institutes of the United Nations crime prevention and criminal justice programme network to include in their work programmes the issue of the rule of law, particularly aspects pertaining to crime prevention and criminal justice, with a view to understanding whether there are links between transnational organized crime, drug trafficking and corruption, and, if so, to establish the degree and nature of those links as well as the challenges they may pose to the rule of law, and to develop appropriate training material;

Requests the Secretary-General to submit to the General Assembly at its sixty-eighth session a report on the implementation of the present resolution;

Invites Member States and other donors to provide extrabudgetary resources for these purposes in accordance with the rules and procedures of the United Nations.

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

What subjects does this mandate have?

What’s in this document?

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