The Federation of Judicial Officers of Greece and the UIHJ organised an international conference on statements of facts by judicial officers on 3 October 2024 in Athens.
Judicial officers from 17 countries were present (Algeria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Congo, Estonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Scotland, Spain, USA), as well as a representative of the Ministry of Justice of Greece, a representative of the Association of Lawyers of Greece and the President of the Chamber of Notaries of Greece.
The UIHJ and the European Union of Judicial Officers (UEHJ) were represented by their President, Marc Schmitz, almost all the members of the UIHJ board and all the members of the UEHJ Executive Committee.
The chair of the conference, Dimitris Tsitsonis, Vice President of the Federation of Judicial Officers of Greece, welcomed the participants to Athens. He recalled that the judicial officers’ statements of facts had recently become a full-fledged activity for the profession. He thanked the Ministry of Justice of Greece for its collaboration with the Federation of Judicial Officers of Greece.
Panagiotis Karakonstantis indicated that the Greek Ministry of Justice, which he represented, was keen to work with the Federation of Judicial Officers of Greece to jointly carry out the reform that had extended the competence of Greek judicial officers as regards statements of facts.
Nikolaos Giannis, President of the Federation of Judicial Officers of Greece, thanked the Ministry of Justice of Greece for its collaboration as well as the UIHJ for its help and support. He considered that by widening the scope of statements of facts for the benefit of Greek judicial officers, the new law was a great conquest for his profession.
Ilias Tsipos, judicial officer (Greece) and Vice-President of the UEHJ, thanked Marc Schmitz and Françoise Andrieux, Honorary President of the UIHJ, for having sown the first seeds that allowed the emergence of statement of facts by judicial officer in Greece. He then thanked Patrick Gielen, Secretary of the Board of the UIHJ, and Mathieu Chardon, Secretary General of the UIHJ, for their unfailing support and great responsiveness, contributing to the success of the legislative process.
The conference included four presentations. Françoise Andrieux presented the statement of facts from the angle of its origins and its contributions. She reported that statements of facts appeared in France in 1342 and were the subject of a first legislative text in 1955. She then evoked the history of statement of facts in Greece and the assistance of the UIHJ since 2005 when the idea was born for the judicial officers of Greece to carry out this activity. She insisted on the importance of statements of facts in the justice system which meets the needs of all litigants and allows better administration of justice.
Patrick Gielen mentioned that 23 of the 46 countries of the Council of Europe judicial officers can exert statements of facts. He indicated that this tool can be used within the framework of Regulation (EU) 2020/1783 of 25 November 2020 (taking of evidence) as well as in Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of 27 April 2016 (General Data Protection Regulation). He called for judicial officers to become “competent courts” within the meaning of Article 1 of Regulation 2020/1783 so that the statement of facts is truly an international tool. Finally, he stressed the importance of e-Codex within the framework of Regulation 2020/1783.
After recalling that Greece is one of the seven founding members of the UIHJ in 1952 and praising the excellent relations between the Federation of Judicial Officers of Greece and the UIHJ over all this time, Marc Schmitz gave a very detailed presentation on statements of facts made using drones. He explained the interest for judicial officers to carry out statements of facts using drones. However, a drone is not a simple tool like a camera or a video camera. Its nature requires that the person using it has received very complete training that will ensure compliance with the very numerous and complex standards in force in the field of aviation, in particular that in force in the European Union since 1st January 2021. He also addressed the issue related to the use of drones in terms of privacy, with regard to Article 8 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights, or the GDPR Regulation. He believes that it is necessary to put in place legal measures to define the use of drones by judicial officers. Then, statement of facts using drones will become a very effective tool for judicial officers.
Finally, Apostolos Anthimos (Greece), lawyer, member of the UIHJ Group of Experts, discussed in detail the practical realisation of statements of facts by the Greek judicial officers. The conference on statements of facts allowed all the participants to get precise information on this tool and on the reasons why judicial officers of all countries had to be able to perform them. The UIHJ intends to continue to ensure the promotion of this vital legal instrument and to help the countries to set it up, as it was the case with Greece.
