On 12-14 April 2023, the IIJ returned to Nairobi for the third of five activities under the Canada-funded project to strengthen mutual legal assistance in Kenya and Somalia. The National Consultation for Kenyan Stakeholders assisted Kenyan practitioners from competent authorities in finalizing key foundational documents and identifying areas where their mutual legal assistance (MLA) and extradition mechanisms could be reinforced.
As with the prior activity the IIJ organized in December 2023, the event was broken into two distinct parts. During the first portion of the event, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP) finalized its internal prosecutorial Guidelines on MLA, building on the draft prepared at the December 2022 workshop. With the support of the IIJ and other partners, the ODPP aims to issue its internal guidelines by the end of the year. The second portion of the workshop gathered representatives of Kenya’s competent authorities and other relevant institutions, including the judiciary, the Ministry of Foreign and Diaspora Affairs, the ODPP, the Kenyan Police, and the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission to discuss concrete ways to implement the Roadmap developed last December and expand it to include challenges and solutions for improving Kenya’s extradition mechanisms.
The next and fourth event under the grant, scheduled for May 2023 in Nairobi, will gather Somali authorities to continue the important work undertaken at an IIJ event in February 2023. The IIJ will then implement a final, joint meeting with Kenyan and Somali practitioners in July 2023 to share progress made throughout the project and discuss practical approaches to improving MLA and extradition between the two countries.