The judiciary independence and professionalism are relevant not only from the human rights perspective, such as the right to a fair and just trial, but they are also an exceptionally important component of the modern democratic countries, due to their influence on the rule of law. In that sense, the countries have taken a series of steps at the global level in order to ensure basic guarantees for independence of the judicial system. Recognizing the interconnectedness and the conditionality of professionalism and independence in relation to the judicial system, recommendations related to that refer to the opportunity and freedom of expression and association that is enjoyed by judges, followed by basic training and continuous training, requirements and procedure for selection, promotion and responsibility, as well as the mandate, immunity and conditions for practicing the profession. Similarly, steps have also been taken at the regional level, which, in addition to providing recommendations on the independence of the judiciary, also add the relationship and the mutual connection between the judicial, legislative and executive authorities.
In the frames of these recommendations, one can notice the close connection and the mutual relationship between the independence of the judiciary and the professionalism and quality of the judiciary as a whole. In other words, the more independent the judiciary is from the legislative and executive authorities, the more likely it is that it will be of higher quality – on the other hand, the quality and professionalism of judges and other stakeholders in the judicial system inevitably contributes towards strengthening its independence and provides resistance to external undue influences on the judiciary. The independence and professionalism of the judicial system are closely related to the fight against corruption, because independence and professionalism do not only refer to resilience of judges and the judicial system as a whole to corruption, occurrences of corruption and conflict of interest in the judiciary, but they also affect the efficiency of the government efforts to prevent and suppress corruption.
Advancing the work of the Association of Judges and the Association of Public Prosecutors