The Libyan Attorney General, Al-Siddiq Al-Sour, said in his speech on Tuesday during the International Scientific Conference on the Criminal Justice System that many of the laws recently issued by the House of Representatives (HoR) were enacted without study or research, singling out the anti-terrorism and cybercrime laws and the law for fighting “witchcraft and sorcery.”
Al-Sour said that his office had noticed that there were crisis laws issued by the HoR to meet urgent needs or to satisfy public opinion or part of it, but in most cases they had flaws or shortcomings; either harsh penalties, a violation of freedoms, or an expansion of police powers.
“These laws were based on the concept of protecting public order and neglected the necessity of protecting values and interests.” He explained.
Al-Sour said the penal code, as a regulator of social behavior, must be derived from the values and interests rooted in the living conscience of society.
He also called for the use of innovative scientific research in order to develop the penal and criminal procedure laws that revolve around criminal legislation.
“Criminal justice research must focus on the concepts of legitimacy, accountability, and effectiveness to verify the extent to which systems, interventions, and punishments have intended or unintended effects.” He remarked.
He said that the idea of the conference was to pave the way for researchers who aspired to contribute to the quality of criminal justice based on the quality of research.
