The Algerian Club of Magistrates has denounced the “arbitrary measures” against a number of judges, calling for expediting measures that ensure the independence of the public prosecution.
In a press statement issued Tuesday, the Club criticized the summoning of Prosecutor Mohamed Belhadi by the Ministry of Justice’s Inspectorate.
They described it as a serious violation of the judicial practice and a sign on the authorities’ “thirst” to violate the constitution.
The judges said Belhadi’s decision to consider several Hirak detainees as innocent is not an exception to the judiciary’s basic law. There are hundreds of public prosecution appeals to acquit and enforce the law, they added.
The statement stressed that this generation of judges, derived from a great peaceful popular revolution and movement, aims for the independence of the judiciary from the justice minister and seeks to steer it clear from ministerial interests.
Earlier, the Inspectorate summoned Belhadi, who is the assistant undersecretary of the court of Sidi Mohamed in Algiers, after ruling on the innocence of 19 protesters.
Belhadi faces a charge of “committing a grave professional error” because of his rejection of instructions made by an executive authority on the cases of protesters.
If found guilty, the judge would be removed from his post.
The Club of Magistrates, which was formed in 2013, has more than a thousand young judges as members.
Its first mission was to reject former President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s candidacy for a fifth term and boycott the presidential elections of last July, which were later canceled.
