On guarantees of professional rights of defense lawyers in criminal proceedings

The article is devoted to the issues of guarantees of professional rights of defense lawyers in criminal proceedings. Numerous violations in this area are reported by the Federal Chamber of Lawyers of the Russian Federation, which organized in January 2021 the conference "Significant violations of the professional rights of lawyers as a threat to the rule of law", which was attended by both representatives of the legal community and scientists-specialists in the field of criminal procedure, forensic medicine, psychology, etc. The reason for the conference was the situation that took place in May 2020 in Kabardino-Balkaria, when lawyers were not allowed to see the detainee. The authors analyzed the available publications on this topic, law enforcement practice and came to the following conclusions. It is necessary that the heads of investigative bodies, the prosecutor's office and the court respond properly to the violations of the professional rights of defense lawyers in criminal proceedings. It is necessary to introduce amendments and additions that draw the attention of officials to the inadmissibility of violations of the current legislation in this area, in departmental acts, as well as in generalizing the practice of decisions of higher judicial instances. In addition, specific examples of violations of the professional rights of lawyers should be analyzed. It is necessary to find out whether this is due to the imperfection of the current legislation regulating a particular situation. If problems of this kind are identified, they should be eliminated by making changes to the current legislation.