Continue to promote legal and judicial cooperation and legal training cooperation with US partners

Working with the US Department of Justice
Speaking at the meeting, Deputy Minister Dang Hoang Oanh highly appreciated the good cooperation between Vietnam and the United States in recent times as well as the US's support for Vietnam through cooperation projects funded by USAID, including projects in the legal field. The Deputy Minister also shared information about Vietnam's efforts to build and perfect the socialist rule-of-law state, while emphasizing the need to continue to learn and gain experience from international partners, especially from the United States. The Deputy Minister hoped that the two countries' Ministries of Justice would promote cooperation in the legal and judicial fields in accordance with the needs and strengths of the two sides, and coordinate the implementation of a number of cooperation activities in flexible forms, combining direct and online forms.
The representative of the US Department of Justice - Mr. Bruce Swartz, Deputy Assistant Attorney General for International Affairs, highly appreciated the visit of Deputy Minister Dang Hoang Oanh in the context of the increasingly developing cooperation between Vietnam and the United States. Mr. Bruce Swartz affirmed his willingness to coordinate with the Vietnamese Ministry of Justice to further promote legal and judicial cooperation between the two sides. In particular, in the coming time, the two sides can coordinate to organize a number of online seminars related to cybercrime, enhancing access to justice for people... The US Department of Justice also expressed its desire to send experts to participate in cooperation programs and projects sponsored by USAID and INL for the Vietnamese Ministry of Justice in the future.
Working with the Congressional Research Service (CRS)
CRS is the public policy research institute of the United States Congress, supporting committees and Members of Congress. CRS experts support every stage of the legislative process - from initial legislative deliberations before drafting bills, through committee hearings and legislative expert work sessions, to oversight of enacted laws and support activities for other agencies. The delegation was received and worked with by a number of CRS Public Defenders and Asia experts. Speaking at the meeting, Deputy Minister Dang Hoang Oanh emphasized the role and responsibility of the Ministry of Justice in the work of building and perfecting laws and expressed his desire to learn from the experiences of countries around the world, including the United States, to study and selectively refer to the building and perfecting of laws to meet the requirements set out in the process of implementing Resolution No. 27-NQ/TW on building and perfecting the socialist rule-of-law state of Vietnam in the new situation. The CRS highly appreciated the visit and said it was ready to share information and experiences with Vietnam. Also during the meeting, the delegation learned about some specific contents about the US law-making process, the issuance of administrative decisions under the US Administrative Procedure Act (APA), etc.
Working with the U.S. Department of State's International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Network (INL)
Receiving and working with the Delegation was Ms. Shelby Smith-Wilson, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in charge of the INL Office. At the meeting, Deputy Minister Dang Hoang Oanh thanked INL for its active support in sending invitations and coordinating the arrangement of the Delegation's working program in the United States, informed about the Ministry of Justice's participation in implementing a number of activities within the framework of the Letter of Agreement on Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Assistance between the Government of Vietnam and the Government of the United States (LOA) signed in May 2016 with funding from INL, introduced the functions and tasks of the Ministry of Justice in drug prevention and control, and expressed the hope that INL will continue to support the Ministry of Justice in the future.
INL briefly introduced the main functions and tasks of INL, including providing financial support to international organizations to carry out cooperation activities abroad in the field of drug prevention and some other fields, providing financial support and organizing the operation of 06 drug prevention training centers in 06 countries. INL said it is willing to share information and invite Ministry of Justice officials to participate in training courses at these centers (through the US Embassy in Vietnam), and will study the possibility of promoting cooperation activities in the field of law and justice based on the proposal of the Ministry of Justice of Vietnam.
Also during the working session, the delegation exchanged and discussed with INL some US experiences related to anti-corruption laws.
Working with the U.S. Department of State's Office of Trafficking in Persons (J/TIP)
During the meeting, Ms. Cindy Dyer, Ambassador-at-Large of J/TIP, highly appreciated the achievements that Vietnam has achieved in the fight against human trafficking in recent times, and at the same time suggested that Vietnam continue to further improve the law and organize law enforcement in this field. Deputy Minister Dang Hoang Oanh introduced the role of the Ministry of Justice in developing and improving the law on the fight against human trafficking, sharing information on new points and advances in Vietnam's law on the fight against human trafficking. Also at the meeting, the delegation learned about the United States' experience in some specific legal provisions as well as the implementation of anti-human trafficking activities.
Working with Columbia University Law School
Speaking at the meeting, Deputy Minister Dang Hoang Oanh informed that Vietnam always pays attention to promoting legal training and fostering to develop legal human resources, especially high-quality human resources to serve the process of building and perfecting the rule of law state in the new period by accelerating the implementation of important projects approved by the Prime Minister, such as the overall project "Building Hanoi Law University and Ho Chi Minh City Law University into key schools for training legal staff", the project "Building the Judicial Academy into a major center for training judicial positions", the project on training lawyers to serve international integration. The Deputy Minister expressed his hope that US universities, including Columbia Law School and University, will strengthen cooperation and support law training institutions under the Ministry of Justice in effectively implementing these projects, creating opportunities for Vietnamese students, lecturers and legal staff to study and research in the United States. In particular, the Deputy Minister hoped that Hanoi Law University and Columbia University Law School would discuss and sign a Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation between the two schools. In addition, the Deputy Minister also requested Columbia University Law School to support the organization of training courses in the United States for officials and civil servants of the Ministry of Justice, especially young civil servants with specialized expertise.
Professor Adam Kolker, Dean and Executive Director of the Program in Comparative Law and International Law, Columbia Law School, expressed his pleasure to welcome Deputy Minister Dang Hoang Oanh and the delegation from the Ministry of Justice. The professor emphasized that personal relationships between professors are important in establishing and promoting cooperative relationships between training institutions and expressed his willingness to support the connection between professors of Hanoi Law University and Columbia Law School. The professor also shared some ideas for future cooperation such as: (i) Hanoi Law University and the Judicial Academy can send lecturers/PhD students to participate in short-term professional research programs (visiting programs) of Columbia Law School to conduct independent research, participate in guest lectures, and act as ambassadors to connect cooperation between the two institutions; (ii) send lecturers and students to participate in existing training programs of Columbia Law School; (iii) Columbia University Law School can design tailor-made courses on certain topics and subjects upon request and from funding from the Vietnamese Ministry of Justice; (iv) training facilities of the Vietnamese Ministry of Justice can invite professors from Columbia University Law School to teach and present at seminars.
During the working trip, the delegation also visited the Vietnamese Embassy in the United States and the Permanent Mission of Vietnam to the United Nations. On July 25, the delegation successfully concluded its working visit to the United States and returned home.
In addition, on August 1, Deputy Minister of Justice Dang Hoang Oanh received and worked with Ms. Shelby Smith-Wilson, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL), US Department of State.
At the reception, Deputy Minister Dang Hoang Oanh highly appreciated and thanked Ms. Shelby Smith-Wilson, INL and the US Government for their active and effective support in the field of law and justice for Vietnam in the past time. The information, knowledge and international experience gained from the implementation of cooperation programs and projects with the US are very useful and have been studied, consulted and selectively applied by the Ministry of Justice, legal and judicial agencies of Vietnam, in accordance with the conditions and actual situation of Vietnam in the process of building and perfecting the legal framework and policy-making process, law-making to enhance the transparency and effectiveness of the legal system; improve the effectiveness of state management and accountability of state agencies; enhance the comprehensive participation of target groups, focusing on some vulnerable groups in society, gender equality and women's development.
The Deputy Minister shared that the Vietnamese Ministry of Justice has a Judicial Academy that is increasingly improving the professional capacity and skills of lecturers; perfecting the program and curriculum on skills for lawyers; skills for judicial positions related to the fields of drug prevention and international law enforcement. The Deputy Minister hopes that INL will cooperate with the Judicial Academy to improve the professional capacity and skills of lecturers, lawyers and judicial positions related to the fields of drug prevention and international law enforcement; at the same time, increasing the integration of drug prevention and international law enforcement contents into the curriculum and teaching programs for students at Hanoi Law University.
Sharing information about the results of the recent working group, the Deputy Minister said that the group had meetings with the US Department of Justice; INL; Joint Trafficking in Persons (J/TIP); US Congressional Research Service (CRS); Columbia University Law School. The meetings were all successful. In addition to useful professional content, the two sides also discussed measures to promote cooperation between the Vietnamese Ministry of Justice and US law and justice agencies to continue the positive results in the recent past.
The Deputy Minister hopes that INL will continue to promote effective and active cooperation and support activities in the legal and judicial fields that Vietnam is interested in and the US has strengths in, such as law enforcement; crime prevention; enhancing access to justice; protecting vulnerable groups; training and improving staff capacity.
Thanking the Ministry of Justice and Deputy Minister of Justice Dang Hoang Oanh for the welcome, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, INL, US Department of State Shelby Smith-Wilson congratulated Vietnam on being upgraded to Tier 2 in the report on combating human trafficking. At the same time, Ms. Shelby Smith-Wilson hoped that the cooperation between the two Ministries of Justice in the field of law and justice will be increasingly substantive and effective.