17 December 2020, the final meeting of the Union of Criminalists and Criminologists was held at Kutafin Moscow State Law University (MSAL). The meeting was opened by the Union’s President, Igor Matskevich, Doctor of Legal Sciences, Professor.
A special guest of the meeting was Guzel Udachina, judge of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Tatarstan, Honoured Lawyer of the Republic of Tatarstan. She delivered the main report on the activities of the Constitutional Court in the Republic of Tatarstan.
After that, Prof. Igor Matskevich highlighted the results of the Union’s activities achieved in 2020. Despite the coronavirus pandemic, the Union has arranged many Russian and international scientific events over the past year. Igor Matskevich noted that the Union of Criminalists and Criminologists journal, which has been published since 2013, this year began to be published according to schedule – every quarter. All issues of the Journal are publicly available on the Union’s website: https://crimescience.ru/?p=1564.
‘I want to pay special attention to No. 3 of the Union of Criminalists and Criminologists journal. It is dedicated to Azerbaijan. The presentation of the Journal was also held in Azerbaijan, although very modestly due to the pandemic. Several Union of Criminalists and Criminologists branches have been opened in other cities. Regular conferences are also held, including abroad,’ Igor Matskevich stressed. He also said that the Kazakhstan conference had to be held online as well due to the pandemic. However, this was not and would not be an obstacle for developing international relations of the Union.
‘This year, we welcomed our colleagues from Hungary. We will do all the necessary paperwork to open a representative office. At the level of the Minister of Justice of Vietnam, we received a proposal to register a representative office of our Union in this country, and now we are waiting for their response under a bilateral agreement,’ Igor Matskevich said.
‘This year we once again held the annual International Summer Law School, which was supervised by Professor at MSAL Tatiana Poniatovskaya and Uwe Hellmann, Head of the Union’s Representative Office in Germany. The topic of the Potsdam Summer Law School in 2020 was medical criminal law. Students and professors from MSAL, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Pskov State University, HSE, RUDN, and RSSU traditionally took an active part in the School’s work,’ the President of the Union concluded. ‘The Union of Criminalists and Criminologists should acquire the status of an international organization in the near future – the process of re-registration is currently being completed.’
Igor Matskevich clarified that these are not all events held under the auspices of the Union, and particularly noted the active work of the Union’s branches.
‘There already are seven Honorary Professors of the Union of Criminalists and Criminologists. We award them the corresponding certificates at the end of the year. In 2020, the title of Honorary Professor was awarded to the President of the Themis Fund Anton Treushnikov,’ Igor Matskevich summed up. According to the results of the year, the Head of the Union Bureau, Doctor of Legal Sciences, Professor Yuri Skuratov was awarded the Union Honorary Diploma.
Candidate of Legal Sciences, Associate Professor, Head of the Moscow Criminological Office of MSAL Sebila Salamova spoke about enthusiastic participation of students in the Union’s activities.
‘According to the results achieved in this year, we held five Roundtables with the participation of MSAL students. Students of two Dagestan universities took part in one of them. Next year, we also plan to invite students from third-party universities. Moscow Criminological Office together with the Union of Criminalists and Criminologists conducts students research competitions. Students are awarded valuable gifts according afterwards. Another area of work is interviews with prominent scientists, executives and public figures, which we publish in our Journal. The first interview of this year was with Prof. Dr. Yuri Skuratov, which aroused great interest among our students. The second discussion was with Director of the Forensic Examinations Institute of MSAL Elena Rossinskaya. Students are greatly interested in the Union’s activities participation,’ added Sebila Salamova.
In conclusion, Igor Matskevich thanked his colleagues for participating in the conference. The President expressed confidence that next year all the criminalists and criminologists will be able to gather together at the Union conference in person.
Here, you can watch the record od the meeting (in Russian): https://e9kpv.app.goo.gl/22N6S2XGCKaF92PfA (password: 12345)
Translated by Elizaveta O. Ovchinnikova
