"Milestones 2025" conference in a modern yet traditional form
12 April 2025, Častá-Papiernička
The International Conference "Milestones of Law in the Central European Space 2025" with the central theme "The Rule of Law in the 21st Century: challenges, opportunities, and global perspectives" opened its 19th year for doctoral students, researchers, and teaching staff in the field of law in the V4 countries on 10-12 April 2025 at the premises of the National Council SR Special Purpose Facility in Častá-Papiernička. The event was traditionally held under the auspices of the Dean of the Faculty of Law of Comenius University in Bratislava Eduard Burda.
The Conference primarily aims to prepare young scientists for their professional careers. The importance of the event lies not only in the presentation of the results of the work on the chosen topic, but also offers a space for feedback, both from colleagues and invited experts. It also provides a platform for the exchange of experiences and ideas, for the development of communication skills and establishment of new contacts. This year's conference brought together young researchers from law faculties in Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary, thanks to the financial support of the Visegrad Fund. The nineteenth year saw a record attendance of 191 participants.
The Department of Criminal Law, Criminology and Criminalistics welcomed, as in previous years, the most participants. The main theme of the section "Current Challenges, Opportunities and Global Perspectives of Criminal Law" focused on the latest trends and challenges in the field of criminal law in the global context. Topics related to the application of institutes of criminal law, challenges in the application practice, as well as changes in criminal codes were discussed.
The section Legal Communication in Foreign Languages with the topic "Legal Language in Professional Discourse" was a new one at the conference. It primarily focused on the linguistic and legal aspects of translating and teaching professional legal terms in English, discussing solutions for translating legal texts with an emphasis on accuracy, consistency, and the specifics of legal systems. The aim was to promote interdisciplinary dialogue and knowledge exchange to improve the quality of understanding between legal systems and to improve the processes of teaching professional legal language.
The conference is essentially focused on legal science, but this year's programme also offered four professional workshops to develop the skills and abilities of participants. The first workshop was held in cooperation with the Slovak Environmental Inspectorate (SIŽP) on the topic "In the field with SIŽP". "We are looking forward to this cooperation and we are glad that two experts, Richard Ardó and Matúš Kysacký, accepted the invitation and presented the participants not only the solutions to the issue of extraordinary deterioration of water quality but especially the technical equipment that the Inspectorate currently has to carry out its inspection activities. Participants were able to see new drones, spectrometers, and other modern equipment firsthand, as well as a demonstration in the outdoor area showing how technology that uses smoke testing can accurately delineate, for example, an unregistered wastewater outlet pipe that discharges into a river.," said Dr. Matúš Michalovič from the Department of Administrative and Environmental Law of the Faculty of Law, CU.
Other workshops were dedicated to the topics of electronic monitoring of defendants and convicts, legal design - tools for the modern lawyer, and internship opportunities for students within the EU.