|
Case Study: JUSTICE FOR RWANDA
- In a three-month period during 1994, between 500,000 and one
million ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus were murdered in Rwanda.
- The perpetrators were a section of the Hutu community who had
gained political power. Most of the victims were unarmed civilians,
including women, children and even newborn babies.
- Having failed to prevent the killings, the international community
set up the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in
order to bring the perpetrators to justice.
Analysis
Based in Tanzania, the Tribunal's job is to prosecute Rwandans who
carried out or incited others to carry out the genocide or other
crimes against humanity such as the systematic rape of Tutsi women.
Brutal though they were, the people who committed
these crimes are entitled to a fair trial with legal representation.
Defendants can choose from around 100 lawyers from all over the
world and the cost is met by the international community.
The ICTR can override national courts but it does
not have the power to make arrests and so it relies on the co-operation
of national police forces to arrest and hand over suspected criminals.
The ICTR has tried and sentenced many political and military leaders
at the time of the mass killings, including Jean Kambanda, former
Prime Minister, and Augustin Ndindiliyimana, former Chief of Staff
of the Rwandan Military Police.
The Tribunal's priority is to bring to justice
the leaders and instigators of the genocide, leaving the Rwandan
government to deal with those who had a smaller part in these crimes.
However, the Rwandan legal system was in ruins after the war and
there is a backlog of 120,000 people in jail awaiting trial.
A report by the Organisation of African Unity estimates
it will take hundreds of years to try them at the current rate of
prosecutions. As this case shows, justice can be expensive; it should
also be timely.
|
