Auspicious Result of Binational Cooperation:

Code of Civil Procedure of Cambodia

Completely ruined by decades of civil wars, having strived for restoration of all
fields, Cambodia has been on her path to another achievement. The Ministry of Justice of
Cambodia, under cooperation with Japanese government through technical assistance of
JICA without which the achievement may not have been made, had spent not less than a
decade on studying and drafting Code of Civil Procedure which was adopted by the
National Assembly on 26 May 2006 and promulgated by the King on 10 July 2006. Yet,
this CCP is not for use until July 2007, a period of which the dissemination is expected to
be finished, elapses.
Code of Civil Procedure is one of the outputs of Cambodian government set forth
in its legal and judicial reform policy. Since 1979 until currently, Cambodia has not had
any specific procedural laws to govern judicial proceedings before the courts in civil
matters. Yet, most judges rely primarily on his knowledge left from Code of Civil
Procedure 1947, administrative directions of MoJ and law on enforcement of civil
judgment adopted in 1992 all of which are the heritage of French legal system.
The new Code of Civil Procedure makes significant changes on the current
system that is known as authority-oriented system by which court plays active roles in
trying to find justice for disputed parties. The new CCP introduced by Japanese legal
system, if it were to be so regarded, brings about the new aspects of civil procedure
known as controversial system by which complainant and defendant have to actively
prove their allegations. Two of the outstanding aspects are “preparatory proceeding for
oral argument”, mechanism upon which parties have to submit evidenced proofs to
support their claims and counterclaims, and “oral argument”, based on which the court
will render a final judgment.
Upon its application, this new product is expected to gain more trust of people as
well as to provide more justice to parties in civil disputes.

By Boren & Senera

(This article was translated into Japanese and published in CALE bulletin in mid 2007)