Source: UNESCO

From 15 to 18 June 2026 in Qatar, UNESCO and the Supreme Judiciary Council of Qatar delivered a four-day training on artificial intelligence and the rule of law that gathered 34 participants (20 women and 14 men) from courts, ministries and national agencies to convert global principles into practical judicial strategies. The session built on earlier UNESCO trainings in 2022 and a regional Arab‑region training in 2024 and brought together judges, prosecutors, cybersecurity experts and international-affairs specialists to examine AI from operational, technical and policy perspectives. The training was facilitated by Kamel El Hilali, Khalid Mohammed Saleh Al-Rumi and Judge Mohamed Samir Marei.

Participants identified three core lessons: first, human oversight and judicial independence must shape any AI deployment in courts, with systems enabling judges to assess AI-produced or manipulated evidence and to avoid undue vendor dependence; second, global standards must be translated into national guidance, using UNESCO’s Guidelines and the AI and Rule of Law Checklist (developed with the University of Oxford) to assess transparency, evidence integrity and governance roles; and third, AI’s impact on evidence and transparency—including deepfakes and hallucinations—is the real test, requiring clear professional standards, verification protocols and practical decisions about what information on AI use should be communicated to litigants and the public. The training concluded with discussions on cybersecurity, digital sovereignty and longer-term judicial implications, and marked the start of closer cooperation for continued capacity-building and guidance development between UNESCO and the Supreme Judiciary Council of Qatar.