THE ISSUE OF JUVENILE CRIMINAL JUSTICE Key words: criminal justice, youth, criminality, the age of criminal responsibility This diploma thesis presents the summary of the most discussed problems and disagreements of the juvenile criminal justice. The main in this are children and juveniles in their specific evolution which needs protection and attention from the specialized public. This thesis includes the reactions of judges, prosecutors and officers of Probation and Mediation service and the specification of the problems they have in the practice. There are also included the opinions of the children and juveniles to the issue of the criminal justice which could possibly relate to them. There are six capitols where I summarize at first the development of the criminality, with attention to the causes and possible solutions for decrease. At the other point there is a brief historical overview of development of the juvenile criminal justice in the world and in czech countries. Further I focused on contemporary legal regulation which is presented by Law no. 218/2003 Coll. of juvenile justice. I tried to evaluate the law, analyze the purpose and all the changes both substantive and procedural which the law brought to the czech legal system and I could summarize that it is a modern and succesful act...

La situation du mineur délinquant a très tôt suscité l'attention du droit pénal, le mineur est désormais soumis à un traitement différent de celui infligé aux adultes. Avant de déclarer un mineur coupable d'une infraction, sa responsabilité pénale doit être déterminée ainsi que son discernement établi sous peine d'atténuation de la responsabilité. La société et ses mineurs ont évolué donc ce sujet d'actualité est devenue une priorité nationale en France mais aussi au Maroc, l'appréhension des mineurs a beaucoup évolué et le droit pénal des mineurs est actuellement l'une des préoccupations majeure des pouvoirs publics qui entendent apporter des réponses encore plus efficaces aux problèmes de la délinquance juvénile. Le mineur a acquis un statut spécifique en droit pénal. Le but du projet consiste à déterminer l'effectivité de la législation actuelle et l'évolution de la responsabilité pénale dans ces deux Etats. L'heure est au bilan et aux perspectives. / The offender minor situation early attracted the criminal law attention. Today the minor is subject to a treatment different from the adult's one. Before adjudged a minor guilty of an offense, his penal liability has to be determined and his discernment must be established. Today's society and his minors have evolved, so this topic becomes a national priority in France and also in Morocco, the minor's apprehension changed a lot and the juvenile criminal law is currently one of the major concerns of government which aims to provide a legally sound solution. The minor has acquired a special status in criminal law. The project aim is to determine the effectiveness of the current legislation and to analyse and synthesize the evolution of criminal responsibility in these two countries. It's time to take stock and prospects.

Zuzana Kučerová: Child Soldier in International Law Abstract This thesis deals with child soldiers from the perspective of the international law. It is predominantly concerned with two questions: protection of children from recruiting and their possible criminal responsibility for international crimes. After a short introductory chapter, which covers a brief history of child soldiers, the second part gives an overview of international legal instruments which aim at preventing the underaged from being recruited into armed groups, as well as from taking part in hostilities. Those instruments belong to three different branches of international law: humanitarian law, human rights law and international criminal law. The author concludes that international criminal law in particular is the best instrument to protect children from becoming child soldiers. The reason is that international criminal law applies directly to individuals, including non-state actors such as commanders of paramilitary forces. It is also in force at the times when there is no armed conflict as defined by international humanitarian law. The third part of the work focuses on criminal responsibility of children for international crimes. The major question in this field is whether we can prosecute children for those crimes at all. On the one...

Derived from centuries-old English laws, Australian laws ascribe criminal responsibility to children according to their age and their assumed level of understanding of the rightness and wrongness of certain acts. This project first charts the creation and development of the English and Australian positions. Then, using insights from postmodernity and the idea of deconstruction, the law is critically assessed to reveal practical, theoretical and moral limits in the law's attempt to do justice. The justifiability of the current Australian legal positions is questioned by demonstrating the law's internal inconsistencies, by revealing the law's historical and philosophical preferences, and by contrasting the law's restricted ambit of inquiry with contemporary knowledge from other disciplines including developmental psychology and sociology.

The revision of laws and the application of culpability to those most responsible for serious humanitarian law violations has functioned as a necessary condition for achieving peace in most post-war societies. However, there is an embarrassing silence when it comes to addressing the question of whether children are to be subjected to the principle of individual criminal responsibility. As morally controversial as it is, the question remains fundamental. Unfortunately, children have been involved in armed conflicts, as victims primarily, but not exclusively. Children are among those accused of having committed brutal and terrible international crimes in times of armed conflict when part of armed groups or armed forces. And with no consensus within the international community regarding their status within International Criminal Law — no established law within International Law and no consistent practice among states on the issue— the problem of criminal accountability of children accused of international crimes remains unanswered. The current work conducts a legal positivist analysis with the focus of investigating the contribution of the Special Court for Sierra Leone to the current debate on children’s criminal responsibility under International Criminal Law. Among significant contributions, the Statute of the Special Court brought one interesting innovation to the debate on children’s potential criminal responsibility. Juveniles starting at age fifteen would be considered viable for prosecution if among those most responsible for the Special Court, as established in Article 7.1. The above innovation translates into two essential contributions to the debate on children criminal responsibility for international crimes: first the Special Court was the first international court to elect a minimum age of criminal responsibility (MACR) at age fifteen to be operational within the scope of the court. Secondly, and equally important, the court reflected the position that children, after the stipulated MACR would be considered, at least a priori, viable subjects of the international criminal system.