New Technologies in International Law / Tymofeyeva, Crhák et al.

Figure 7: Incoming cases in the first instance Criminal Courts (2016-2018), Source: ( Stata CEPEJ ).

According to figure (7) the median of received criminal cases of first instance courts is 1.7 per 100 inhabitants in (2018), compared to 1.6 in (2016). The majority of countries and entities (more than 50%) reported from 1.0 to 5.0 received criminal cases per 100 inhabitants, while the minority ratio is below 1.0. We find that Cyprus (7.8 cases), Israel (5.1 cases), Montenegro (12.0 cases) and Serbia (28.0 cases) reported the highest rates of incoming cases. By contrast, Armenia (0.1 cases), Azerbaijan (0.1 cases) and Ukraine (0.3 cases) have the lowest number of received cases per 100 inhabitants. Also, Serbia achieved a high jump in the incoming criminal caseload from 7.1 to 28 and Montenegro from 6.2 to 12.0. Conclusion and Policy Recommendation Conclusion This research dealt, firstly, with the concept of digital transformation, the development of such concept, its importance, its relationship with other concepts and its significant influence on the rule of law. Then, the research covered and examined the impact of DT/ICT on access to justice. The research found a significant positive relationship between using DT/ICT and facilitating access to justice. DT/ICT can achieve economies of scale. It has a positive effect on the clearance rates (CR) and facilitates access to justice. Processes can be standardised and delivered at lower costs and at higher quality. The costs of communication can be limited, thus saving travel costs and waiting times. This preliminary finding makes it possible to identify other trends regarding the impact of DT/ICT from the perspective of efficiency and quality. It seems that the good level of development of DT/ICT tools cannot be systematically linked to a good level of court performance. Indeed, the most technologically advanced countries do not always have the best indicators for efficiency. The reason for increased (or reduced) performance is in fact to be found in the combination of several factors such as the

47