Editor-in-Chief’s Note
This issue appears after six months of war in Ukraine. Every day of this unjustified war, people die fighting for our independence and freedom, for the rule of law and human rights. The only thing we can do as scholars is to continue our research, disprove false ideas and support the truth, and develop institutions and mechanisms for the protection of rights. Justice must prevail without any grounds for exclusion, and scholars should contribute to this goal.
The AJEE Gateway ‘Access to Justice Amid War’ helps to share quality research results in a timely manner. As a founder of this initiative, I believe it contributes to continuing and developing the latest research in the area of law in wartime. In this issue, we collected ten notes related to legal developments in wartime. I am particularly glad to see an article from a Syrian scholar in our journal, with a particular focus on the idea of military operations against a sovereign state.
Since wars are an unfortunate constant of human history, a balanced approach to the definition of law and mechanisms for preventing its violation and conflicts is necessary. The main goal of this approach should be the limitation and diminution of these conflicts, as well as the minimisation of the consequences and resources for their resolution.
With this in mind, the focus of our research project ‘Access to Justice Amid War’ will be to promote the voices and reflections of ordinary people suffering from war and convey their expectations about justice in cooperation with leading law scholars, sociologists, and economists tasked with finding ways to rethink justice based on the challenges of the wartime experiences and directed towards the sustainable development of the post-war period. Justice should prevail – this is the most important thing, and is a strong base for rebuilding peace. The restoration of Ukraine should be the next important goal for our research focus.
The AJEE Gateway ‘Access to Justice Amid War’ allows us to collect data and reports from various areas of law, covering the main types of illegal behaviour and people’s expectations regarding legal remedies. We believe that our authors will also focus their attention on the particular issues of the further restoration of Ukraine.
The first notes from this initial research gateway have been published as Online First Articles during these months and are included in this issue.
On behalf of our team, I thank all the authors who joined us and answered the call for materials related to the war in Ukraine. For the following issues, we are also seeking research on further legal reform in the period of the restoration of Ukraine after the war.