The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, Margaret Satterthwaite, invited Member States, national human rights institutions, and other relevant State institutions, international and regional organizations, civil society, scholars, activists, and other interested individuals and organizations, to provide written inputs for her next thematic report on artificial Intelligence and judicial systems. The report will be presented at the 80th session of the UN General Assembly in October 2025.

The ECBA responded to the invitation with an elaborated paper on the subject, acknowledging the growing role of technology in criminal law and criminal procedure, the current digitalisation of justice and the many other rapid developments in this domain, e.g. the rise of AI, digital evidence, the role of encryption in communication and financial flows and the use of video connections in court procedures or for remote communication. These developments must comply with the right to privacy and nondiscrimination, procedural safeguards and must have sufficient effective legal remedies. Due to the rapid development in the technical field, the ECBA also considers it important that lawyers have knowledge in this area and that our members can exchange experiences from the various Member States and learn from them. This has led to the ECBA setting up this working group that focuses on the entire digital aspect within criminal law and criminal procedure. Taking into consideration the Call for input of the Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers for her next thematic report on artificial Intelligence and judicial systems, the ECBA submitted the input/comments you can read here.