China explores volunteer litigation service mechanism for settling complaints involving lawsuits

BEIJING -- China has been exploring a litigation service mechanism featuring volunteer experts to help settle public complaints in the form of letters and visits that involve lawsuits, according to the China Law Society.

Since 2014, the China Law Society has dispatched nearly 1,500 volunteer experts to the litigation service center of the Supreme People's Court to help in the resolution of over 4,000 cases of complaints in the form of letters and visits.

Having gone through a selection procedure involving recommendation, application and approval, the experts are qualified to provide services covering various fields ranging from criminal, civil and commercial to intellectual property and law enforcement.

The next step is to continuously promote the integration of legal study and judicial practice and explore long-term mechanisms for the participation of third parties in judicial services, said Zhang Sujun, deputy head of the China Law Society.