The participants in the study visit with Jörg Gaus (centre), Department 43 of the Office of Criminal Police Investigations of Lower Saxony, and Senior Public Prosecutor Mergen Mendigaliyev (on his left), Head of the Delegation Kazakhstan
From 28 to 30 October 2019, a delegation from the Kazakh Office of the Public Prosecutor General visited the Office of Criminal Police Investigation of Lower Saxony, the Competence Centre for the Prevention of Islamism in Lower Saxony, the Ministry of Justice for Lower Saxony and the Office of the Public Prosecutor General in Celle. The study visit on “Combating Terrorism in Germany” was organised by the IRZ.
Seven senior public prosecutors, who are involved in the fight against extremism and terrorism in Kazakhstan, and a leading academic from a research centre at the Academy for Combating Terrorism and Extremism learned about the following subjects in Lower Saxony:
Risk and threat management in the area of Islamist endangerers,
the system for assessing the danger of radicalised persons,
presentation of guidelines for dealing with religious and political extremism in law enforcement,
measures for deradicalisation/cooperation with the non-governmental organisation Violence Prevention Network,
networking with communities and local civil society and
presentation of the work involved in the prevention of Salafist radicalism.
The delegation was particularly interested in the structures and processes of the authorities, specific investigation measures and prevention work, particularly when it comes to the recruitment of children. In each case, the Kazakh system was compared with the German system. The Kazakh guests also expressed their approval of the European network and of the success rate of the transnational cooperation between EU countries. Both sides are very interested in continuing to work together on this in the future.
The Kazakh delegation visiting the Regional Court of Kempten: Gunther Schatz (4th from left), Vice-President of the Regional Court; Adlet Rayev (6th from left), Senior Public Prosecutor at the training institute of the Office of the Public Prosecutor General of the Republic of Kazakhstan; Christian Roch (on his right), Presiding Judge at the Regional Court of Kempten Kazakhstan
From 14 to 16 October 2019, a delegation from the Kazakh Office of the Public Prosecutor General and the Law Academy of Law Enforcement Authorities visited Bavaria to learn about basic and further training for judges, public prosecutors and the police in Germany. The working visit, which was attended by public prosecutors from the Kazakh Office of the Public Prosecutor General and employees of the Law Academy of Law Enforcement Authorities at the Office of the Public Prosecutor General, was organised by the IRZ.
The Kazakh guests visited the Local Court of Sonthofen, the Regional Court of Kempten and the Bavarian State Ministry of Justice, where the focus was on the following main topics:
Basic and further training for police officers,
studies, preparatory training and state exams for judges and public prosecutors,
conduct of criminal proceedings in Germany (stages of the proceedings, indictment),
appointment of staff for courts and public prosecutor’s offices,
further training for judges and public prosecutors in Bavaria and
cooperation with the German Judicial Academy.
The following experts were among those appointed by the IRZ to take part in the working visit:
Christian Roch, Presiding Judge at the Regional Court of Kempten,
Prof. Dr. Bijan Nowrousian, a professor in criminal law and the law of administrative offences at the University of Applied Sciences for Public Administration and Management of North Rhine-Westphalia
Sebastian Pitz, a judge at the Regional Court of Kempten and Memmingen and head of the working committee for trainee lawyers, and
Theresa Beck, Bavarian State Ministry of Justice, HR Department.
The participants showed a great deal of interest in the topics covered during the working visit and the discussions with their German colleagues were very fruitful. The Kazakh guests would like to continue this type of cooperation in future.
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), together with the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Kazakhstan, organised a seminar on 16 and 17 October 2019 on “Copyright Protection in the Internet: Problems and Prospects”. Most of those attending this event were employees of Kazakh judicial authorities and representatives of judicial authorities in the Russian Federation, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. The subjects covered by the forty or so participants at the event included:
An overview of the activities of the WIPO,
the enforcement of Intellectual Property Law,
the legal framework for protecting copyright and related property rights on the Internet,
the legal nature of online piracy,
enforcing copyright under civil law,
voluntary measures for recognising copyright law,
the latest European reforms of copyright law and
the liability of website operators.
Ministerialrat Matthias Schmid, Head of Division at the German Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection, was appointed by the IRZ to take part in the event. His lecture on the latest European reforms of copyright law was met with great interest in the lecture hall.
Both days of the seminar were structured around lectures followed by round table discussions. All the speakers took part in these discussions, including those from the WIPO, the CIS and the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media. This led to a lively debate on current topics concerning the copyright situation in Kazakhstan and on the protection of copyright on the Internet. It soon became clear that the copyright issues that are currently under discussion in Germany are just as relevant in Kazakhstan.
The seminar was successful and productive, paving the way for future events on this subject.
