On 05 July 2018, the Chief Justice of South Sudan, H.E. Justice Chan Reec Madut, signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Head of Sub-Saharan Africa and Jordan Projects, Dr Kathrin Maria Scherr, signing on behalf of the Max Planck Foundation for International Peace and the Rule of Law.
This Memorandum of Understanding envisages an extension of the existing cooperation between the Judiciary of South Sudan and the Foundation until the end of 2020 to include technical legal assistance on the rule of law, within the framework of the project Strengthening the Rule of Law in South Sudan. This cooperation will involve a series of activities geared towards the provision of legal capacity building to Justices of the Supreme Court and Courts of Appeal, as well the Judges of the lower courts of South Sudan. Additional technical assistance will also be provided in the publication of selected judgments of the courts as well as in support to the establishment of a legal library of the South Sudan Judiciary.
This cooperation with the Judiciary of South Sudan constitutes one component of the project Strengthening the Rule of Law in South Sudan (2017-2020), which is being implemented with the generous financial assistance of the European Union. The project aims to provide technical assistance and legal capacity building to key rule of law actors in South Sudan, including the Judiciary, the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs, the Transitional National Legislative Assembly, and various other justice sector stakeholders. The overall objective of this project is to increase the understanding and ability of actors in South Sudan on key principles of the rule of law.