When I arrived at the office, Chimge told me that I needed to register with immigration, because I will be staying in the country for more than 30 days. She arranged for CHRD's driver to take me to the immigration station at the airport, 11 miles from town. Nancy and I spent about three hours, being driven to and from the airport and waiting on lines and getting the requisite forms completed. The driver, Galaa, whom I expect to hire for future trips to the countryside, was invaluable, both for his ability to negotiate the incredibly anarchic Ulan Baatar traffic and in dealing with the immigration bureaucrats.
In the morning, Chimge and I spent about two hours discussing the clinic, and case selection criteria. Under the Mongolian legal system, the plaintiff, in addition to filing a complaint, is responsible for presenting all of the relevant evidence, exclusive of oral testimony which is subject to cross-examination. Experts are apparently retained by the court, rather than by individual parties. There is no provision for pretrial discovery.
In talking to Chimge, I got the impression that there are no formal standards for the admissibility of evidence, and the question of what evidence will be considered is a matter of pure judicial discretion. Since I will be advising students on what evidence they should be gathering, I will also need to advise them as to what evidence is likely to be persuasive. Chimge was intrigued by the concept, common to the United States, of a law of evidence, and, particularly of a code, such as the Federal Rules of Evidence.
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