국제인권규약상 공정한 재판을 받을 권리

The right to a fair trial is protected under Article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (“ICCPR”). Article 14 paragraph 1 provides the right to equality before courts and tribunals and the right to a fair trial by a competent, independent, and impartial tribunal established by law. Article 14 paragraph 2 to paragraph 7 provides specific guarantees of procedural rights in criminal proceedings: presumption of innocence, minimum guarantees in criminal trials, juvenile trials, right to review of conviction and sentence by a higher trial, right to compensation for miscarriage of justice, and the principle of ne bis in idem. The Human Rights Committee (“HRC”), the treaty body of the ICCPR, has given guidelines for interpretation of Article 14 in their general comments, concluding observations on state reports, and views in individual communication cases. This paper attempts to explain the meaning of procedural guarantees in each paragraph of Article 14 by examining the above documents issued by the HRC. The paper proceeds to review South Korea’s practice on the right to a fair trial, focusing on the changes in the judicial criminal system and other issues where international human rights standards are not met. By clarifying the minimum guarantees to be respected regardless of institutions and legal traditions of state parties, this paper aims to contribute to the full implementation of procedural guarantees in South Korea.