CLA News / Endorsement of the Commonwealth Military Justice Principles and Model Laws: A Commonwealth Milestone in Principled and Practical Reform

By His Honour Judge Alan Large, Judge Advocate General of the UK Armed Forces, and Francisca Pretorius

In many smaller Commonwealth jurisdictions, Defence Acts were enacted at independence and have remained largely unchanged for decades. The result is that military justice systems have not kept pace with developments in international humanitarian law, human rights law, or constitutional jurisprudence and are in need of reform. In February 2026, at the Commonwealth Law Ministers Meeting in Fiji, Law Ministers formally endorsed the Commonwealth Military Justice Principles and the accompanying Commonwealth Model Law on Military Justice for Smaller Armed Forces.

The initiative was the culmination of a multi-year effort, and reflects sustained collaboration between judges, practitioners, and member country representatives across the Commonwealth, with consistent support from the Commonwealth Lawyers Association (CLA). The association has, over the years, contributed to the wider conversation on fairness, independence, and accountability in military justice, and its continued engagement helped sustain momentum through a long and technical process.

Origins of the Initiative

The Commonwealth Military Justice Transformation Project commenced in 2022 pursuant to a mandate issued by Law Ministers at the Commonwealth Law Ministers Meeting that year. The work was undertaken under the auspices of the Commonwealth Secretariat’s Office of Civil and Criminal Justice Reform (OCCJR). At the time, Francisca Pretorius served as Head of the OCCJR.

The project responded to a practical and widely recognised challenge. Independence-era Defence Acts often reflected sound legal thinking at the time they were drafted, but in the decades since, developments in international law and constitutional jurisprudence have moved on, while many of these statutes have not. Reform was needed, but it also had to be realistic about the resource constraints facing smaller jurisdictions.

The Commonwealth Military Justice Principles

The first phase of the initiative focused on the development of high-level Principles.

An expert working group, led by His Honour Judge Alan Large and supported by Francisca Pretorius, engaged in nearly a year of structured online meetings before convening in Stellenbosch, South Africa, in November 2023. At that meeting, the group finalised a draft set of ten Principles designed to articulate foundational standards for smaller armed forces (the Stellenbosch Draft).

These Principles were subsequently reviewed and refined through a formal intergovernmental Working Group comprising representatives from Commonwealth member states across all regions. Through structured consultations and virtual deliberations, the text was shaped to reflect both expert insight and member-state ownership, a process that took the Principles from an expert draft to a document with Commonwealth-wide support.

The Principles are non-binding but function as aspirational benchmarks against which jurisdictions may assess existing systems and orient future reform. They articulate core standards relating to independence and impartiality of military courts, separation of investigative, prosecutorial, and judicial functions, fair trial guarantees and due process, qualifications and security of tenure for judicial officeholders, appellate and review mechanisms, transparency and accountability, and alignment with international legal obligations.

To our knowledge, this is the first time an intergovernmental body has formally endorsed a consolidated set of military justice principles tailored specifically to smaller armed forces, which is significant for the development of military justice globally.

The Model Law for Smaller Armed Forces

The Model Law constituted a distinct, though complementary, second phase of the project.

Smaller armed forces operate within particular structural constraints. Limited personnel numbers and institutional proximity can make separation of functions, investigative, prosecutorial, and judicial, more complex to operationalise than in larger jurisdictions. Reform must therefore be principled, but also realistic and scalable.

It was against this backdrop that the Model Law was drafted by Christopher Griggs of New Zealand, drawing on comparative Commonwealth practice and informed by the Principles. Following preparation of the draft, a separate intergovernmental Working Group, again comprising representatives of Commonwealth member states, reviewed and refined the Model Law through structured engagement with the Secretariat.

The Model Law provides a practical legislative template that is adaptable to different constitutional arrangements, scalable to smaller force structures, and structured to include options in certain areas, enabling jurisdictions to select alternative formulations suited to their institutional realities. It is not a prescriptive instrument; it offers a carefully designed toolkit from which jurisdictions may draw when modernising Defence Acts.

The separation between the development of the Principles and the drafting of the Model Law was deliberate. It allowed normative questions, such as what military justice systems should look like, to be tackled independently of the more technical question of how those standards could be translated into workable legislative text.

Endorsement by Law Ministers

The endorsement by Law Ministers in Fiji confirms that both the Principles and the Model Law have moved beyond expert recommendation to formal Commonwealth recognition.

This endorsement does not impose binding obligations on member states. It affirms a shared commitment to principled reform and provides a structured pathway for those wishing to undertake legislative review. For an organisation as constitutionally diverse as the Commonwealth, that the Principles and Model Law secured endorsement reflects a true convergence of views on the requirements of fair and accountable military justice.

The Road Forward: From Endorsement to Implementation

While the endorsement marks a significant milestone, implementation now becomes the central task. Several member states have already expressed interest in technical assistance to review and update their defence legislation in light of the new benchmarks.

For this phase, the Principles provide the normative compass and the Model Law provides the structural blueprint. The pace and depth of reform will ultimately depend on member state engagement and ownership, and early signals are encouraging.

The role of professional associations such as the CLA will remain important in this next phase. This organisation, alongside the Commonwealth Secretariat, is well placed to support implementation through its networks of practitioners and judicial officers, and to help ensure that reform efforts are informed by practical experience on the ground.

Member states interested in receiving support to review or update their defence legislation are encouraged to contact Mr Mukhtar Adesunkanmi, who is stewarding this work going forward, at m.adesunkanmi@commonwealth.int.

The endorsement of these instruments is not the end of the project; it is the point at which the real work begins.

By His Honour Judge Alan Large, Judge Advocate General of the UK Armed Forces, and Francisca Pretorius