International Criminal Court (ICC)
LIBYA: The ICC might investigate and prosecute further cases, as announced to the UN Security Council
In the presentation of her ninth report on Libya to the UN Security Council, ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda has deplored the deteriorating security situation in the country due to frequent and brutal assassinations, terrorist attacks and threats to media workers, human rights defenders and women. The prosecutor added that the ICC considers investigating and prosecuting further cases despite States bear the primary responsibility to investigate and prosecute their nationals in the first instance. As stated by Bensouda, although the Libyan Prosecutor-General's office has cooperated with the ICC, the Libyan government has not surrendered Saif al-Islam al-Gaddafi to the Court, among other failed obligations. The prosecutor has demanded that a State with experience in transitional justice could partner with Libya to help restore stability and strengthen accountability for war crimes, and that the Libyan authorities should facilitate a visit by representatives from Misrata and Tawergha local councils to New York to meet and engage with Security Council members. Denouncing the severe deterioration in security, the collapse of the judiciary and the subsequent state of impunity in the country, Human Rights Watch has called the ICC to exercise its mandate and expand her investigations into ongoing crimes. The human rights organisation has stated that prosecuting exclusively al-Gaddafi officials is no longer sufficient. (ICC, HRW, 12/05/15)
    Ad Hoc International Criminal Tribunals
KOSOVO: EULEX sentences to prison 11 Kosovo Albanians for war crimes
The EU Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX) has sentenced 11 Kosovo Albanian men to three to 12 years’ imprisonement for the Drenica I and Drenica II cases. They have been charged for war crimes against Kosovo Albanian civilians (including the intentional perpetration of violence, cruel treatment, beating, torture, humiliating and degrading treatment of civilians and for some the killing of a Serbian police officer), between June and September of 1998 at a detention centre in Likovac. The sentenced men, former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army, include Kosovo's former ambassador to Albania, Sylejman Selimi, and the mayor of Skenderaj/Srbica, Sami Lushtaku. Hundreds of Kosovo war veterans protested over the conviction of the former KLA commanders known as the “Drenica group” arguing the verdict diminished respect for the independence war and demanded their release. EULEX was created in February 2008 to investigate crimes committed by Albanian Kosovar rebels during the 1998 war with Serbia. (EULEX, 27/05/15; Balkan Transitional Justice, 28/05/15; Jurist, 30/05/15)
LEBANON: Special tribunal hears witnesses
The Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) has heard witnesses on the Ayyash et al case, in which five Hezbollah members are accused of assassinating former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in February 2005, and on the al-Jadeed and al-Khayat case, in which the media channel al-Jadeed and the journalist Karma al-Khayat are accused of intentionally trying to undermine the court by publishing information about witnesses. In the Ayyash et al case, the Tribunal has heard the testimony of the leader of the Progressive Socialist Party, Walid Jumblatt. While recognising he has no evidence to prove his accusations, the Druze leader has claimed that Bashar al-Assad’s Syrian regime is responsible for Hariri’s assassination. The leader has not blamed the Hezbollah combatants accused for the crime. Some days later, the STL has heard the declarations of the executive director of the organization Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism, Rana Sabbagh, and the head of Lebanon's National Audiovisual Media Council, Abdel-Hadi Mahfouz, on the case against al-Khayat and al-Jadeed. Hearings will be resumed in June. (The Daily Star, 08, 13/05/15)
    Truth commissions
BALKANS: Women’s Court names crimes and perpetrators against women
Ten civil society women’s groups from all over the Balkans have held a “Women's Court on war crimes against women during the war in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s” in Sarajevo for three days. The so-called Court was not meant to deliver any verdicts, but to name the main crimes committed against women and their perpetrators. The hearings included statements from 38 witnesses, who shared their experience on the war against civilians, sexual crimes, military violence and neutralisation of women, ethnic violence, as well as socioeconomic crimes against women. It is the first time a women’s tribunal is established in Europe. It is believed that the armed conflict in the Balkans was the first scenario where rape was used as a war weapon among other sexual crimes. About 20,000 women are estimated to have been raped at the time. (Women in Black, WeNews, 09/05/15)
TIMOR LESTE – INDONESIA: Family members meet after recommendations of Indonesian and Timorese Truth Commissions
The governments of Indonesia and Timor Leste have launched a program to facilitate reunion of family members separated from each other during decades due to the armed conflict in East Timor (1975-1999). These reunions of 15 Indonesians aged 24 to 50 have taken place in Timor Leste’s capital, Dili, with the support of the National Commission for Human Rights along with several Indonesian and Timorese NGOs. The initiative was put forwar by the Commission for Truth and Friendship of Indonesia (KKP) and by the Timor Leste Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (CAVR, in its Portuguese acronym). The CAVR (2001-2005) concluded that at least 102,800 civilians had died during the conflict. Around 18,600 of them were unlawfully killed or disappeared and at least 84,200 people died from hunger and disease. The KKP (2005-2008), established by the Indonesian government to uncover the truth in the aftermath of the 1999 referendum, documented gross human rights violations in Timor Leste. The highest number of unlawful killings and disappearances occurred in 1999. But the number of Timorese children who were told their parents had died is unknown. Many of them were adopted by Indonesian orphanages or members of the military while their parents were taken out of Timor. (The Jakarta Post, 19/05/15)
TUNISIA: Truth commission begins hearings
Tunisia's Instance Vérité et Dignité (Truth and Dignity Commission) has started the hearing of testimonies from victims of violations of human rights committed by the regimes after the country’s independence (1955-2013) during Habib Bourguiba and Zeineddine Ben Ali’s presidencies and by the Tunisian 2011 post-revolution government. The president of the Commission, Sihem Bensedrine, has informed that the process will last two years, and that witnesses will give testimony behind closed doors. Since December 2014, the Commission has received applications from 12,700 victims from all political affiliations and from different periods to participate as a witness. Created by the Law on Transitional Justice in December 2013, the Commission is composed by jurists, human rights activists, victims' associations representatives and opposition members to Ben Ali’s. The Comission is endevour to identify within 5 years those responsible for abuses, make them accountable and rehabilitate and compensate the victims. The Comission will also look into the State’s responsibility for the mass killings perpetrated during the 1955 independence movement, the torture and imprisonment of approximately 30,000 trade unionists, students, left opposition members and Islamists; and into the casualties incurred during the 2011 Arab Spring revolution where 338 people died and 2,147 were wounded. (Al-Huffington Post, 27/05/2015)
BURKINA FASO: The National Reconciliation and Reforms Commission consults the population about their concerns and reform suggestions
The National Reconciliation and Reforms Commission (NRRC) has interviewed people around the country to find out their concerns and suggestions for reforms. During this time, the Comission has met with trade unionists, businessmen, traders, religious communities, media, and a large number of civil society organisations. People interviewed have asked for better governance and greater care of the common good, and for the Commission to address not only political but also economical crimes. In parallel, the Commission has also opened a one-month on-line participatory process where citizens can send their suggestions to foster reconciliation or to promote electoral, constitutional, political, institutional, finance and media reforms. The Commission, which was set up in December 2014, has been criticised for not addressing the issue of “truth”. The limited Commission mandate, which hinders documenting political and economical crimes, caused the resignation of the jurist and member of the Commission, Siaka Coulibaly, in March 2015. At that moment, Coulibaly warned that without documenting the past, neither truth nor justice could be reached, and reconciliation would not be genuine. However, in parallel to the tasks of the Commission, the government has initiated the exhumation of the body of former President Thomas Sankara, assassinated in 1987, to help identify the corpse. (NRRC, 18, 22/05/15; Le Pays, 15/05/15; BBC, 25/05/15)
    Truth seeking investigations
ISRAEL-PALESTINE: Two reports document war crimes by Israeli and Palestinian combatants
The Israeli organisation Breaking the Silence which monitors respect for International Humanitarian Law has published more than 60 testimonies of Israeli soldiers that participated in the July and August 2014 war in Gaza. The report concludes that civilian infrastructure was destroyed without operational justification, and that the Israeli military employed a policy of indiscriminate fire. The organisation has qualified the rules of engagement during the armed confrontation as the most permissive it had ever seen, which shows a drastic change in the IDF's combat norms, such as the principle of using th necessary minimal force. As a result, Breaking the Silence has called for an external investigation. As a reply, the Israeli Army (IDF) has committed to investigate all credible claims, but added that the organisation has refused to provide any evidence of the accusations. Shortly after, Amnesty International has published a report concluding that Hamas Palestinian armed group committed serious human rights abuses, including abductions, torture and summary and extrajudicial executions of Palestinian people with impunity during the same period. AI has also blamed the armed group and the de facto Palestinian administration for not prosecuting unlawful killings and other abuses. Violence in summer 2014 caused the death of 2,189 Palestinians, including more than 1,486 civilians, and 67 Israeli soldiers, including six civilians. (BBC, 04/05/15; AI, 26/05/15)
SYRIA: Several human rights organisations document war crimes in Syria
Amnesty International has published a report focussed on Aleppo which concludes that civilians in that city are suffering unthinkable atrocities.These violations, including aerial bombardment of civilian neighbourhoods by government forces using artillery against civilians, and arbitrary detention and torture by both sides, amount to war crimes and, in some cases, to crimes against humanity. Based on more than 100 interviews, the report blames the Syrian government for adopting collective punishments through the use of the barrel bomb, an improvised explosive which is so inaccurate that its use is considered by some a de facto war crime, against public markets, mosques, schools, hospitals and medical centres in Aleppo. AI stresses that despite both sides are violating international humanitarian law, Bashar al-Assad government forces have been responsible for the large majority of crimes. Figures estimate that more than 3,000 civilians died in barrel-bomb attacks in Aleppo province from January 2014 to March 2015, along with 35 fighters, and that over 12,000 have been killed by the weapon across Syria since 2012. For all these reasons, Amnesty called for the referral of the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court (ICC) and unhindered access for the UN's independent commission of inquiry. (AI, 04/05/15; The Guardian, 05/05/15)
    Redress
GERMANY – RUSSIA: Germany apologises and announces compensations to WWII Soviet prisoners
Coinciding with the commemorations of the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, and amid political tensions between Russia and Germany for the Ukranian armed conflict, German President Joachim Gauck has recognized, at the site of a former prisoner-of-war camp of Stalag 326 Senne, that the Nazi were merciless with imprisoned Soviet soldiers. Gauck also unveiled a stone plate engraved with the names of 900 dead who have been identified. Days after that, the German government has announced it will allocate 10 million Euros as reparations for surviving Soviet prisoners of war held during World War II. The 4,000 Soviet prisoners of war who remain alive will be offered 2,500 Euros as an individual reparation. Germany captured 5,3 million Soviet prisoners of war, and between 50 and 60% of them died of starvation, disease and exhaustion, which makes them the second largest group of victims of the Nazis, after the Jews. The move has been opposed by some politicians of the German Christian Democratic party, who have argued that the responsibility for helping former Soviet Army soldiers lies with Russia, as Germany paid due compensation to the states of the former Soviet Union in the 1990s. Organizations supporting victims, meanwhile, have deplored the compensation comes too late, as there are very few survivors. Victims’ support organisations have deplored that the compensation comes too late, as very few survivors remain alive. (DW, 06/05/15; DW, Wall Street Journal, 20/05/15)
    Memory
ALBANIA: Albania opens partially secret police files of the communist era
The Albanian parliament has passed a law that opens partially the Sigurimi communist secret service files and creates a commission to handle the requests for information. The “Right to Information on files of the former Security of the State of the Former People Socialist Republic of Albania” law, approved after a 25 year long debate, concedes the right to request information only to people named in the files, or to those who collaborated with the secret police. The law also bans the 10,000 former Sigurimi officials from taking public office, which does not include the 20% of the population who collaborated with the secret police between 1944 and 1990.The law gives more access to information on missing people, but does not provide for the systematic exhumation of graves and tombs. It is estimated that the Enver Hoxha Communist regime (1944-1991) killed at least 6,000 opponents, deported more than 100,000 to labour camps, and captured 4,500 political prisoners. (Japan Times, 01/05/15; Balkan Insight, 06/05/15)
AUSTRIA: Commemoration of the liberation of Mauthausen concentration camp
About 22,000 people attended the ceremony to commemorate the liberation by US troops of the Mauthausen forced labour camp. After an ecumenical ceremony, Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann has recognised Austria’s complicity with the Nazi regime, qualifying the existence of Mauthausen camp as one of the most horrible chapters in Austria’s history. Bishop Michael Bunker stressed the importance to never forget the victims, and recalled all current forms of forced labour around the world, as child labour, prostitution and human trafficking. Some of the present 50 survivors also shared their testimony on life in the camp. Around 200,000 prisoners from all over Europe - Jews, prisoners of war, political prisoners, conscientious objectors and other opponents of Hitler's Nazi regime – were forced to built war planes and other military equipment in the camp. More than 100,000 died there. Mauthausen was the largest camp in Austria, one of the longest functioning (1938-1945), and the last concentration camp to be liberated in World War II. In April, other commemorations took place to remember the liberation of other camps in Germany, such as Bergen-Belsen, Ravensbrück and Sachsenhausen. (CTVNews, 06/05/15; DW, 10/05/15)
SRI LANKA: Commemoration of the end of the civil war marks some shift towards reconciliation
In the sixth anniversary of the end of the civil war between the army and the Tamil Tigers armed group (LTTE), President Maithripala Sirisena has underlined the need for truth and justice regarding the conflict, and has promised to seek reconciliation. In a symbolic move, the government stopped referring to the celebration as “Victory Day” to call it “Remembrance Day”, to mark the sacrifices made by those killed in the conflict regardless of their ethnic origin. On the other hand, and for the first time since the end of the war, Tamil politicians were allowed to hold a a ceremony in memory of civilians killed on Mullivaayikkal beach in the northern part of the country where the final battle took place Although many people appreciate the approach of the newly elected president, Human Rights Watch has questioned the genuineness of the government, which, only a few days earlier, had promoted Major General Jagath Dias, involved in wartime abuses as chief of staff, one of the army highest post. Between 80,000 and 100,000 people were killed in the armed conflict in Sri Lanka, and about 40,000 Tamil civilians could have been killed in the final few weeks. (HRW, 17/05/15; BBC, 19/05/15)
    Peace talks
MALI: Bamako agreement, which includes transitional justice measures, signed without the support of the main opposition armed group CMA
The Government of Mali and some of the country’s political and military movements have signed the Bamako peace agreement based on the “Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation in Mali from the Algiers Process” signed in the capital of Algeria in February 2015. The agreement includes transitional justice measures such as the setting of an international commission of inquiry to probe war crimes and integrating opposition combatants in the Malian army. Although the signing of the peace agreement is an opportunity to strengthen the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission (CVJR) established in January 2014, the fact that the main opposition armed group, the Coordination of the Azawad Movement (CMA), has refused to sign it, and the continued fighting in the country present a challenge for the future implementation of the Agreement. The armed conflict in Mali, initiated in 2012, has caused many crimes committed by both the state army and the rebels. (Insight on conflict, 22/05/15)
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