Organisation Internationale de Droit du Développement

Myanmar: Rule of Law Center Strengthens Local Justice

“IDLO will help provide the local community with the legal knowledge and skills needed to apply rule of law principles, such as equality and fairness, to local justice issues important to people in Myitkyina," Kartik Sharma, IDLO’s Country Representative in Myanmar told those gathered at an ‘Open House’ event to showcase the Myitkyina Rule of Law Center.

Over 40 community members, civil society representatives, lawyers and teachers from Myitkyina and Kachin State attended the event to learn more about the aims and activities of the Center, which opened last month.

“I see today’s event as a necessary step in the journey towards strengthening rule of law in Kachin”, said U Dau Hkwang of the Kachin Legal Aid Network.

The Myitkyina Rule of Law Center is the second of four schedules to open across Myanmar in 2015, as part of a broader project to provide training for legal professionals and community leaders.

The center will also offer mobile training courses for those in more remote areas, host a legal library, and hold community outreach activities, with the long-term goal of building greater public trust in the formal justice system.

The Centers, supported by the Governments of the UK, Sweden, Finland and other international development partners, are being run jointly by IDLO and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).