15 July 2019

Members of East Timor’s Parliament concerned about seizures and pre-trial detentions that have exceeded time limits

Image of the East Timor National Parliament East Timor Law and Justice Bulletin Warren L Wright
ETLJB 15 July 2019 - Members of East Timor’s Parliament have expressed their concerns about State agents seizing cars, passports and other goods for indefinite periods of time and cases that have not moved forward and have seriously undermined the ability of individuals to conduct their activities, and this poses a threat to foreigners who wish to invest in Timor-Leste.

East Timor’s peak law and justice civil society organisation, JSMP, “believes that the concerns presented by members of parliament are very important because the Constitution and the law grant wide ranging competence to examine and deal with issues that not only include human rights violations and good governance, but also issues of constitutionality and also issues linked to the legislative process to ensure that the legal framework does not contradict human rights principles enshrined in international conventions and the Timor-Leste Constitution itself”, said the Acting Director of JSMP, Casimiro dos Santos, in a press release dated 4 July 2019.

In relation to the abstract review of constitutionality provided in Article 150 of the Timor-Leste Constitution, this has never been carried out to date because the Office of the Ombudsman for Human Rights and Justice (PDHJ) did not sufficient resources.

“The PDHJ received 203 complaints in 2018, comprising 81 cases relating to human rights violations and 122 cases relating to issues of good governance. From this total, proceedings were initiated in 44 cases comprising 23 cases relating to human rights and 21 cases relating to good governance. Meanwhile, the human rights violations recorded included 3 violations of the right to life, 18 violations of freedom, integrity and security, 1 violation of the right to access justice and 1 and violation against women”, the JSMP press release noted.

East Timor Law and Justice Bulletin


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