Dear Colleagues,

It is a real honor for me as the representative of the Library Centre for Legal Information (LCLI) from the Kyrgyz Republic to attend the 2001 Annual Convention of the American Association of Law Libraries. AALL has almost a century of history and plays an important role in the area of democracy and development of law librarianship. The history of democracy in my country dates back only 10 years and the LCLI at this moment celebrates its 5-year jubilee. We are only beginning our path to democracy and we must make many changes to succeed. The knowledge I will obtain at this conference will help us.
Dear friends, I want to express my sincere gratitude to the people who helped me to attend this conference. I want to express my thanks to Ellen Schaffer and to the Foreign Librarian's Grant Committee for selecting my application from a large number of candidates. This is a real honor for me, for my library and for my country.

I want to address special thanks to Ms. Tracy Thompson and to Ms. Jean Davis for their care and wonderful friendship. Their support and friendly advice helped me get here, overcoming many difficulties. And I must thank Ms. Mirela Roznovski, my best teacher, who helped me learn about the Ellen Shaffer Grant. I also want to express my gratitude to the Organizational Committee and to all members of the AALL and FCIL-SIS for their support.

Now, I would like to say a few words about my workplace. The LCLI where I work opened in 1996. This important project was implemented as a result of a joint activity of the Association of Lawyers of the Kyrgyz Republic and the National Library of the Kyrgyz Republic, with active assistance from the American Bar Association (ABA)'s Central and East European Law Initiative (CEELI). We express a special gratitude to ABA's CEELI Coordinator, Mrs. Terri Rogers. The establishment of the first Public Centre of Legal Information is a reality mainly because of the enthusiasm and professionalism of Mrs. Rogers. We are also very thankful to Mrs. Mary Strauss - the American librarian, for her input in the process of our Centre's establishment. She worked with us during the most difficult and crucial time - the period of formation, opening and first activity. It is very difficult to estimate the practical experience obtained with her assistance.

Other organizations that significantly contributed to our Centre's establishment and its further development include the following: the UNHCR Administration, Democratic Commission of the US Embassy, the Miller and Chevalier Foundation and the Soros Foundation.

From the first, the LCLI founders and organizers strictly defined the Centre's mission as a depository of new information. At LCLI, technologies and resources are open to all categories of users. We have a strong demand for legal information, legal documents, and primary and secondary sources in our country. Every year our Centre is visited by more than 30,000 people who receive more than 150,000 copies of information sources. We work seven days per week, from 8:00AM until 6:00PM. The average number of users reaches 150 to 200 per day.
The Centre's information potential is constantly improving. At present our collection includes 14,000 volumes. We subscribe to more than fifty periodicals and serials. The Centre also has six sound informational and legal databases, including the texts of 200,000 legal and normative documents of the Kyrgyz Republic and CIS countries. We are increasingly using Internet resources in our everyday work. We are also constantly arranging and keeping the contacts with comparable centers and legal libraries in other countries. We keep business contact with legal centres and libraries in Uzbekistan, Byelorussia, Russia and Kazakhstan.

Our Centre is highly efficient. A similar Library Centre of Legal Information opened in Osh in 1998. We maintain close contact with our colleagues, sharing work experience, providing assistance in the area of book fund augmentation, acquisition of electronic information media and solving common operational problems. This year, with the assistance of the ABA's CEELI, we are planning to establish and open additional legal libraries in three regions of our country.
Specialists from the ministries and authorities, public and international organizations are the regular clients of our Centre. In particular, the Ministry of Justice, the Constitutional Court, and the President's Administration, as well as the Parliament, public and private law firms, students and lecturers from institutions of higher education utilize our Centre. We also have priority users to whom we offer some incentives and advantages when using the services in our Centre. They include the members of the Association of Lawyers of the Kyrgyz Republic and the Judges Association of the Kyrgyz Republic.

In 1996, the top-priority of the Centre included the collection of information in the area of human rights protection and international legal cooperation. Later, we received a lot of requests for literature in the area of business law and international contract law. Consequently, we have developed and successfully introduced a project to establish a business law section within our Centre for Legal Information. This project has been financed by the Eurasia Foundation and the Democratic Commission of the US Embassy.

The LCLI widely propagates legal knowledge. It organizes exhibitions, conducts seminars and organizes special "Days of Information" for interested organizations. Every academic year we also provide special training lectures on database operation and searching for information to the legal departments of higher educational institutions at our Centre. Together with the ABA, we have conducted a number of seminars on small business and entrepreneurship, and training courses for lawyers on searching for information on the Internet. Special meetings of lawyers and discussions of draft laws are regularly organized at the LCLI.

The LCLI plans to continue its work in the area of readers' information services. We are also continuing our work in the development of new directions of our activity and expanding horizons of cooperation with international organizations working in the area of legal information.

Dear friends, I am very excited to meet you and learn from you. Finally, I want to express one more time my gratitude for being here with you!