Belfast Guidelines on Amnesty and Accountability

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Transitional Justice Institute

Ulster University Transitional Justice Institute logo.png

The institute's logo which encompasses the University logo(left) and the Institute's logo(right).
Established 2003 [1]
Focus Transitional Justice, Conflict, Human Rights Law, and International Law
Website www.ulster.ac.uk/transitionaljustice

The Belfast Guidelines is a project led by Professor Louise Mallinder and Prof Tom Hadden of the Transitional Justice Institute. The Guidelines examine the principles concerning the legality and legitimacy of amnesties in states transitioning from conflict or authoritarian regimes. [2] They were drafted by an expert group that included Prof David Kretzmer and Prof William Schabas. They have been widely translated into Arabic, Chinese, Malay, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Thai.

Transitional Justice Institute

The Ulster University's Transitional Justice Institute (TJI), is a law-led multidisciplinary research institute of Ulster University which is physically located at the Jordanstown, and Magee campuses. It was created in 2003, making it the first and longest-established university research centre on this theme. In the 2014 Research Excellence Framework (REF) Law at Ulster University was ranked 4th overall in the UK. Ulster was ranked first for impact in law with 100% of impact rated as world-leading, the only University to achieve this in law.

David Kretzmer is an Israeli expert in international and constitutional law. He is professor emeritus of international law of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and professor of law at the Transitional Justice Institute at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland. He has been a member of international and Israeli Human Rights organizations, including the UN Human Rights Committee under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, serving as its vice-chairperson in 2001 and 2002. He established the Centre for Human Rights at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and was a founding member of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, the Minerva Centre for Human Rights, a joint centre of the Hebrew University and Tel Aviv Universityץ He is also a founding member of B'Tselem.

William Anthony Schabas, OC is a Canadian academic in the field of international criminal and human rights law, and has been called 'the world expert on the law of genocide and international law.' He is professor of international law at Middlesex University in the United Kingdom, professor of international human law and human rights at Leiden University in the Netherlands, and an internationally respected expert on human rights law, genocide and the death penalty. He has written over 18 monographs and 200 articles. In 2009 he was elected President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada and a Member of the Royal Irish Academy, as well as holding a position on the Board of Directors of the International Institute for Criminal Investigation and René Cassin, a non-government organisation that presents a Jewish voice on human rights.

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The Ulster University's School of Law, is a School of Ulster University which is physically located at the Jordanstown and Magee campuses. Following the results of the Research Excellence Framework 2014 Ulster is ranked fourth for research in law in the UK, and first in Northern Ireland; Ulster was ranked first in the UK in the new "impact" category; and ranked 9th for research intensity.

An amnesty law is any law that retroactively exempts a select group of people, usually military leaders and government leaders, from criminal liability for crimes committed. Most allegations involve human rights abuses and crimes against humanity.

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Transitional justice consists of judicial and non-judicial measures implemented in order to redress legacies of human rights abuses. Such measures "include criminal prosecutions, truth commissions, reparations programs, and various kinds of institutional reforms". Transitional justice is enacted at a point of political transition from violence and repression to societal stability and it is informed by a society’s desire to rebuild social trust, repair a fractured justice system, and build a democratic system of governance. The core value of transitional justice is the very notion of justice—which does not necessarily mean criminal justice. This notion and the political transformation, such as regime change or transition from conflict are thus linked toward a more peaceful, certain, and democratic future.

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Impunity means "exemption from punishment or loss or escape from fines". In the international law of human rights, it refers to the failure to bring perpetrators of human rights violations to justice and, as such, itself constitutes a denial of the victims' right to justice and redress. Impunity is especially common in countries that lack a tradition of the rule of law, suffer from corruption or that have entrenched systems of patronage, or where the judiciary is weak or members of the security forces are protected by special jurisdictions or immunities.

TJI may refer to:

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References

  1. ↑ "Transitional Justice Institute - About TJI". Ulster University. Retrieved December 22, 2014.
  2. ↑ http://www.transitionaljustice.ulster.ac.uk/TransitionalJusticeInstitute.htmAmnestyGuidelinesProject.htm
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