The rule of law is key to delivering societies that are accountable, transparent, and just. Yet the MENA region’s legal and judicial developments are under-studied and rarely part of the policy discourse, while lawyers are under-resourced and at risk for their work.
TIMEP’s Legal Unit recognizes the instrumental role that the law and legal community play in protecting localized perspectives and shaping the societies in which these perspectives can thrive. Through research and documentation, the Legal Unit makes key legal and judicial developments understandable for policy audiences. Its support and advocacy work lends assistance to lawyers at risk individually and for their work; and its commitment to Arabic legal education is an investment in the future, helping guarantee that the legal community has access to the tools and skill set necessary to advance its contributions.
Unpacking legal and judicial developments is essential to a contextualized understanding of the MENA region and in proposing forward-thinking policy solutions. The Legal Unit’s research and documentation work explains the region’s top legal and judicial issues for a non-technical policy audience.
In Lawyering for Change, TIMEP’s Legal Unit conducts a series of interviews with lawyers, legal practitioners, and academics who explore the roles that lawyers have played throughout the region’s protest movements and revolutions over the last decade. In this Q&A on Egypt, the Legal Unit speaks to Egyptian lawyer Ahmed Ezzat.
It’s no secret that being a lawyer isn’t a walk in the park—the stress, long hours, ever-changing laws, and serious responsibility makes it a hard choice. Today in Egypt, it’s also a risky choice—one that in recent years has led to prison sentences, exile and even death. Historically, lawyers have played a vital role in […]
A fact sheet by TIMEP’s Legal Unit explores how the Syrian regime has used the law as a tool to restrict key fundamental rights and to normalize years of mass atrocity.
As lawyers increasingly face reprisal for their legal defense work and exercise of fundamental freedoms, accessing the international legal and policy space can lend them protection and bolster their domestic efforts. The Legal Unit’s support and advocacy work protects lawyers at risk as human rights defenders and complements their work on-the-ground while leveraging international legal and policy tools.
In an effort to comprehensively address the deterioration of press freedom in Lebanon, this fact sheet proposes recommendations relevant to both the country’s legal framework and its violative practices.
TIMEP and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) have submitted a joint stakeholder report ahead of the third cycle of Lebanon’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR), set to take place in January and February 2021.
TIMEP joins 109 organizations to call upon governments to ensure that the COVID-19 pandemic not be used as pretext to usher in invasive digital surveillance measures.
Recognizing the deteriorating state of legal education in the region and the limited availability of context-specific, accessible international legal resources, the Legal Unit’s education work is an investment in the future of the legal community that crafts and offers practical Arabic learning tools, including courses, trainings, and legal guides.
TIMEP releases “Effective Communication between the Lawyer and Defendant and the Right to a Fair Trial: A Guide for Lawyers in Egypt,” authored by human rights lawyer and legal researcher Adel Ramadan.
