The Conference of Ministers of Justice of the Ibero-American Countries (COMJIB) is an intergovernmental organisation that promotes legal and judicial cooperation among the 22 ministries of justice of the Ibero-American community. It is headquartered in Madrid, Spain.
History The conference began as an informal forum for cooperation under the "Madrid Act" (Acta de Madrid) adopted at a meeting of Ibero-American ministers of justice in Madrid in September 1970.
On 7 October 1992 an extraordinary conference in Madrid adopted the Constitutive Treaty of the Conference of Ministers of Justice of the Ibero-American Countries (the "Treaty of Madrid"), elevating the organisation as an intergovernmental organisation with legal personality under international law.
The treaty entered into force on 1 September 1998 through the ratifications of Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Panama, Peru, Portugal and Spain.
A headquarters agreement with Spain was signed at Punta del Este on 13 November 2007.
On 21 December 2016 the United Nations General Assembly adopted resolution 71/153, granting the Conference observer status.
At its XXI Plenary Assembly in Medellín, Colombia, on 23–25 July 2019, the conference elected former Colombian justice minister Enrique Gil Botero as secretary general and opened for signature the Treaty on the Electronic Transmission of Requests for International Legal Cooperation between Central Authorities (the "Medellín Treaty").
Gil Botero was re-elected for a 2023–2027 term at the XXIII Plenary Assembly in Madrid in June 2023.
Membership The conference is made up of the ministries of justice, or equivalent bodies, of the 22 countries of the Ibero-American community: Andorra, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Portugal, Spain, Uruguay and Venezuela.
According to the organisation, 19 of the 22 have ratified the Constitutive Treaty.
Organisation Under the Constitutive Treaty, the conference is made up of the plenary conference of ministers, a five-member Delegated Commission and a permanent general secretariat headed by a secretary general.
The official languages of the conference are Spanish and Portuguese.
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