Parliament has voted on a new iteration of the Bill on the External Assessment of Judges and Prosecutors, also known as full vetting, introducing changes in accordance with objections formulated by President Maia Sandu.

“What President Sandu has essentially requested is to standardize as much as possible the provisions of the Law on the Assessment of Judges and Prosecutors with the provisions of the Law on the Assessment of Supreme Court Judges”, MP Olesea Stamate, chair of the Legal Commission, told Parliament.

According to Stamate, in particular this concerns the standard of ethical integrity, which differed in the two bills. “It is the right thing to do standardize, to have the same criterion and to give the opportunity to the vetting commission to evaluate all judges equally, regardless of whether they are from the Supreme Court or the appeal courts”, said Stamate.

In the previous version of the Bill, judges and prosecutors undergoing vetting were given the right to appeal the decisions adopted by the respective Councils following the vetting process. Now the Bill has been modified to afford the same right to the Vetting Commission, if the decisions of the respective Councils come into conflict with the results of the vetting.

The legislative proposal introducing full vetting was adopted in late July. The draft law represents the third stage of the vetting mechanism. It is regarded as one of the major conditions derived from the Moldova-EU Association Agreement.