ASEAN Legal Information Portal Goes Online To Assist Legal Professionals

By Sevagamy Nythiananthan KUALA LUMPUR, July 12 (Bernama) -- The ASEAN Legal Information Portal (ASEAN LIP), the first-of-its-kind web portal aimed at supporting regional businesses and empowering legal professionals by providing free and easy access to Southeast Asian legal information is now available online at www.aseanlip.com says its governing council chairman, Associate Prof Dr Johan Shamsuddin Sabaruddin. The dean of Malaysian public university, University Malaya’s Faculty of Law, said ASEAN LIP was inspired by the Free Access to Law Movement, an international movement devoted to providing free online access to legal information. “ASEAN LIP aggregates the latest legal developments from ASEAN countries, including legal news, case law, legislation, treaties and legal scholarship. “It introduces ASEAN Law Alert, a customisable free daily e-mail alert, which allows visitors to receive legal updates on countries and practice areas of their choice. It also features a unique sort tool aimed at making content-browsing easier,” he told Bernama recently. Kuala Lumpur-based ASEAN LIP is promoted by the University of Malaya and Muttath Knowledge Management Services Sdn Bhd, in partnership with some of the leading law schools in the region, including University of Indonesia, Thammasat University and the University of the Philippines. “Actually, it is supported by some of the key stakeholders of the ASEAN legal and business communities including judiciaries, ministries, news agencies and business councils. “By enabling regional businesses, we believe that ASEAN LIP is making critical contribution towards the development of the nascent ASEAN Economic Community,” said Johan Shamsuddin. “In fact, its benefits extend beyond businesses – to legislators, government officials, enforcement officers, NGOs (non-governmental organisations), and of course, to legal and tax professionals. The general public is also going to find it useful”, he added. To more effectively reach out to the businesses, he said ASEAN LIP was planning to go beyond mere aggregation of legal materials. Meanwhile, ASEAN LIP executive director Rajesh C. Muttath said plans were afoot to restate legal developments in a style and language that could be understood by lay people. “Such restatements are a huge challenge, truly resource-draining, but that is what we are going to do. We just can’t dump legal materials on businessmen and women leaving them to decipher the accompanying legalese on their own”, he said. -- BERNAMA