In view of the collaboration agreement between the Academy for the Judiciary at the Ministry of Justice (hereafter referred to as “the Academy for the Judiciary”) and French Ecole Nationale de la Magistrature (the French National School for the Judiciary, hereafter referred to as “ENM”), the Academy for the Judiciary has held annual education exchange program in Taiwan for the intern judge from France. On March 2^nd 2020, ENM sent an intern judge, Eléonore CERVI, for a 3-week exchange at the Academy for the Judiciary.

  In order to help the intern judge from ENM to understand our training and education program and interact with our trainees, the Academy for the Judiciary organized a 3-week learning course to join the curriculum courses for the 59th and 60th batches of intern judge and arranged visits to La France à Taiwan, Ministry of Justice and other cultural tourism experience trips. The 3-week learning course included one week of classes together with the trainees from the 60th batch of judge-in-training, which offered mentor sessions to discuss cases related to judicial ethics and experience sharing of similar cases in France. The course also organized trips to the Investigation Bureau, Ministry of Justice and the Ju Ming Museum. There were internship and practical learning together with the trainees from the 59th batch at Shihlin District Court and Prosecutors Office and a "Weekly Report" session together with the study group in Shihlin. During the "Weekly Report" session, Eléonore CERVI and the trainees exchanged ideas and opinions on the pre-employment training program for judges and prosecutors in France, examination systems for judges and prosecutors in the two countries and other practical learning experience. The course program originally arranged visits to Taiwan Innocence Project, the Customs Administration, Ministry of Finance, New Taipei City Police Department and other agencies to learn more about administrative agencies with the law students in the 60th batch. However, France has also recently experienced the outbreak of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), and ENM had to urgently recall all interns abroad, ending the internship experience in Taiwan early.

  Although the annual exchange program came to an abrupt end, the exchanges and interactions, which included assistance on dormitory, meals and daily life and the joint learning sessions with our intern judge, greatly enhanced the mutual understanding of different systems and cultures, and both sides joined the enriching experience.