Impartial upholding of the law should be judiciary's new normal

Zhang Huanzhi, Nie Shubin's mother, meets mother of Huggilit, a man who was wrongly executed in a rape-murder case in 1996, at the Tian'anmen Square in Beijing, March 6, 2010. [Photo/CFP]

More than 20 years after Nie Shubin, then a young lad, was sentenced to death and executed after being convicted of rape and murder, and 10 years after another suspect confessed he was the actual murderer, Nie's lawyers finally got approval to read all the documents related to his case, a move widely believed to signal there will be a retrial. Comments:

Lawyers had long applied to see the documents, yet their requests were continually rejected, except once in 2013. Even then, the prosecutors only allowed the lawyers to see 26 pages out of 137, and these were selected to prove Nie's guilt. It is the inferiority bestowed upon the defendants and their lawyers that causes innocent people to be wronged and this problem must be solved in order to introduce rule of law.

Beijing News, March 17

The Criminal Procedure Law clearly says that attorneys have the right to browse and copy documents related to their defendants, yet it took two decades for Nie's lawyers to exercise their legal rights. How can people trust a judiciary that behaves like an underground organization? The newly formed court has done a good move by promoting transparency and we hope the case can rekindle public confidence in China's judiciary.

Southern Metropolis Daily, March 18

Even one of Nie's lawyers said the court's transparency had "exceeded his imagination". When illegal activities, such as courts forbidding lawyers from reading relevant documents, are normal, justice will be a joke. What is needed is to establish a new normal in which laws are implemented rather than staying on paper only.

Beijing Times, March 18

Many judicial officials are against lawyers' efforts to review the defendants' files, correct wrong verdicts and prove their defendants are innocent, because they are afraid that the image of the judicial agencies might be damaged. Actually they are only defending the faces and political future of the officials themselves; they never realize that it is their wrong verdicts and the stubborn refusal to correct the wrongs that ruin the image of the judiciary.

Wu Liwei, a Beijing-based lawyer, March 17