Lately, the Supreme People's Court ("SPC") and the Ministry of Justice ("MOJ") have jointly issued the Opinions on Launching the Pilot Program of Conciliation by Lawyers (the "Opinions").
The Opinions propose four different ways for lawyers to work on conciliation, including "setting up offices in people's courts for lawyers to mediate between parties concerned", "setting up offices in public legal service centers (stations)", "establishing lawyers' mediation centers in lawyers associations" and "establishing mediation offices in lawyer firms". Further, the Opinions clearly specify that lawyers may mediate between parties involved in disputes over diverse civil and commercial affairs, including the civil disputes collateral to criminal proceedings but excluding cases filed to request the confirmation of marital relations or identity relations and other cases that cannot be mediated according to their nature. Additionally, the Opinions call for establishing and improving the qualification management rules for conciliation with the help of lawyers, optimizing the mechanism for linking a reconciliation agreement to a payment order, and bettering procedures for judicially recognizing reconciliation agreements. Also, the Opinions propose carrying out the pilot program of conciliation by lawyers in eleven provinces (municipalities directly under the Central Government), including Beijing, Shanghai and Zhejiang.