Interview with Zhang Xueqiao: From promoting environmental protection to controlling Internet violence, how can public interest litigation relieve people's troubles?
China News Agency, Beijing, March 10th: Interview with Zhang Xueqiao: From promoting environmental protection to controlling Internet violence, how can public interest litigation relieve people's troubles?
China News Agency reporter Li Jingze
Recently, China's Supreme People's Procuratorate issued a guiding case, among which the case of a woman taking a courier was transferred from private prosecution to public prosecution.
In this case, the victim was slandered, his work and life were seriously affected, and he suffered "social death", which once caused a heated public debate.
Why did the procuratorial organs turn criminal private prosecutions into public prosecutions?
How do public interest litigation solve the public's troubles?
Zhang Xueqiao, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and deputy chief procurator of the Supreme People's Procuratorate, was interviewed by a reporter from China News Agency during the two sessions, and described the development of public interest litigation in two dimensions.
"Online defamation spreads widely, does great harm, and has bad influence. Victims are faced with difficulty in proving evidence and safeguarding their rights. It is difficult to achieve rights relief through private prosecution, and it is even impossible to effectively pursue criminal responsibility of criminal suspects through private prosecution." Zhang Xueqiao said that public interest litigation is to protect the public. interests, it is closely related to everyone.
Public interest litigation refers to network security, and it is to send a signal to the society that "cyberspace is not an extrajudicial place".
Network security is a microcosm of public interest litigation advancing with the times and expanding its coverage.
Zhang Xueqiao said that since the procuratorial public interest litigation system was formally established in July 2017, the legal territory of public interest litigation has been actively and steadily expanding.
In the past five years, as the "national team" for public welfare protection, the procuratorial organs have pointed the sword of public interest litigation to many fields such as ecological environment and resource protection, food and drug safety, and state-owned property protection.
We will also explore and handle public interest damage cases in the fields of protection of women's and disabled people's rights and personal information, and improve relevant legislation with practical experience.
In 2021 alone, with the support of the National People's Congress and related units, the Supreme People's Procuratorate has promoted the addition of procuratorial public interest litigation clauses to three laws: the Work Safety Law, the Military Status and Rights Protection Law, and the Personal Information Protection Law.
Looking forward to the new year, Zhang Xueqiao pointed out that the Supreme People's Procuratorate will "continue to deepen the protection of the rights and interests of specific groups such as the disabled, women, and the elderly, promote the legalization of barrier-free environment construction; increase the protection of cultural relics and cultural heritage, cyberspace governance, "Exploration in new areas such as anti-monopoly and anti-unfair competition, intellectual property rights, and protection of labor rights and interests in new formats" was included in the "2022 Public Interest Litigation Prosecution Work Points".
Regarding public interest litigation, a "Chinese plan" with the advantages of modern governance, Zhang Xueqiao commented that China's procuratorial public interest litigation has achieved rapid development in a few years, and its case volume and institutional influence are not inferior to the decades of development in foreign countries. .
From the pilot to the full rollout to the rapid development, the environmental field is the first field of public interest litigation. Through this field, the outside world may observe the development of public interest litigation in depth.
The first public interest litigation case filed by the Supreme People's Procuratorate in 2021 - the "South Four Lakes Project" is an example.
Nansi Lake is located at the junction of four provinces. The entire watershed involves 34 counties and urban areas in eight cities. It is an important channel for the east route of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project.
After the Supreme People's Procuratorate's intervention, the integration of various forces and unification of law enforcement standards has achieved initial results.
This case shows two main aspects of the improvement and upgrading of the public interest litigation system:
On the one hand, it is the application of high technology to solve the problem of forensics.
Zhang Xueqiao introduced that in the "South Four Lakes Project", facing a lake surface area of 1,266 square kilometers and a watershed area of more than 30,000 square kilometers, the procuratorial organs applied satellite remote sensing technology for the first time in the judicial field, and used Internet big data collection to effectively detect public interest lawsuits clue.
On the other hand, during the handling of this case, the hearing was broadcast live, and more than 10 million netizens became "cloud supervisors".
"Where are the blocking points and pain points of the public interest, the common people have the most say." Zhang Xueqiao said that the judicial organs should still be sovereign and let the people participate in the judicial activities.
He believes that public interest litigation and prosecution is not a "zero-sum game". The essence is to strengthen the supervision of public interest damage, help government departments to administer according to law, and jointly safeguard the fundamental interests of the people.
"At present, not only is the legal territory expanding, but the 'circle of friends' of public interest litigation is also expanding, and its attractiveness is constantly increasing. The concept of win-win, multi-win and win-win is continuously deepened in cooperation with administrative organs and social organizations." Zhang Xueqiao said.
(over)