During 1969 the minister for youth problems was provided a research center by the Council of Ministers. Its purpose was to investigate the problems experienced by schools, universities, youth mass organizations, the militia, and the courts. As case studies are documented, the center is directed to evaluate the problems and the solutions found for them locally at the time they occurred and to disseminate the information, with additional comments and recommendations, as widely as possible.

In early 1971 a considerably invigorated program was unveiled for the UTC. Wherever possible, all programs were to become more mature and more stimulating. Military exercises would involve field trips and more realistic maneuvers. Aerial sports would include parachuting, gliding, and powered flight. Hobbies, such as model ship building, amateur radio, and the study of topography, were to be given more adequate supervision. Better equipment and facilities would be supplied for touring, motorcycling, mountaineering, skiing, and hiking. More youths were to be scheduled for summer camps. No information concerning the effectiveness of the new programs had been made available by early 1972.

Many university students held their party-sponsored associations in low regard during the middle and late 1960s, and eventually the then-existing student unions were dissolved or consolidated into the new Union of Student Associations. The incentives and pressures that were applied, in addition to revamping the union's programs, had succeeded by 1970 in re-animating the association to the point that it was active in all of the country's universities and institutes of higher learning. It was authorized to make recommendations applicable to extracurricular sports and tourist programs, political education, and the entire academic area of the educational establishment.

Programs for the young pioneer groups have probably not been the object of the same degree of reform effort that has been applied to the UTC and the student associations. A party spokesman stated in late 1971, however, that the 1.6 million pioneers were not too young to develop a socialist consciousness and to be given a communist education. He stated that their major programs should feature direct involvement in work of educational and civic value.

To give young people a sense of accomplishment, as well as to keep them occupied in meaningful and productive work, large numbers of them are organized into youth construction groups. In typical situations temporary housing or camps are built near the project, and all necessary facilities are provided at the site. During the spring of 1970, for example, five such groups were scattered throughout the country, operating concurrently. A majority of the projects have involved land reclamation, irrigation, or drainage. Many of them are major undertakings, and thousands of young people take part in the program.

CRIME AND THE PENAL SYSTEM

During a 1971 discussion on the judiciary's philosophy with regard to the general subjects of law and freedom, the chairman of the Supreme Court stated that the penal code and criminal procedures adopted in 1968 assign to the law the role of regulator of social behavior. The law has become, he said, not simply an instrument stipulating the rights and obligations of the citizen; its important social role provides a firm foundation for society's behavior. Other spokesmen have amplified this theme. They emphasize that, once an individual understands the law and its objectives, he appreciates the fact that individual freedom is related to the freedom of others and that a free individual is bound to respect accepted ideological concepts and accepted moral and judicial standards.

Public prosecutors have a broad range of responsibility in the judicial and penal systems. Their duties are not confined to handling the prosecution of indicted individuals who have been brought to trial. As the appointed protectors of the civil liberties of the people, their duties extend from crime prevention to rehabilitation of criminals serving prison sentences. They are responsible for seeing that crimes are detected and investigated and that penal action is taken against the criminal. They also see to it that the criminal is held in preventive detention, if necessary, before trial. After sentencing, the prosecutors have access to any place in which the criminal might be detained and pass on the legalities of the detention and the conditions within the penal institution. If a sentence either does not involve imprisonment (but is, for example, in the form of a fine, restriction, or extra work) or is suspended, the prosecutors ensure that the terms of the sentence are carried out.

Public prosecutors are monitored by the Office of the Prosecutor General at the national level. The prosecutor general (attorney general) assures that the work of local public prosecutors is consistent throughout the country, both in the choice of cases to pursue and in the diligence with which the prosecution is undertaken (see ch. 8).

Crime