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The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was a body of the United Nations that was established to prosecute the war crimes that had been committed during the Yugoslav Wars and to try their perpetrators. The tribunal was an ad hoc court located in The Hague, Netherlands.
Universal jurisdiction is a legal principle that allows states or international organizations to claim criminal jurisdiction over an accused person regardless of where the alleged crime was committed, and regardless of the accused's nationality, country of residence, or any other relation to the prosecuting entity. Crimes prosecuted under universal jurisdiction are considered crimes against all, too serious to tolerate jurisdictional arbitrage. The concept of universal jurisdiction is therefore closely linked to the idea that some international norms are erga omnes, or owed to the entire world community, as well as to the concept of jus cogens – that certain international law obligations are binding on all states.
The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda was an international court established in November 1994 by the United Nations Security Council in Resolution 955 in order to adjudicate people charged for the Rwandan genocide and other serious violations of international law in Rwanda, or by Rwandan citizens in nearby states, between 1 January and 31 December 1994. The court eventually convicted 61 individuals and acquitted 14.
Belgium's War Crimes Law invokes the concept of universal jurisdiction to allow anyone to bring war crime charges in Belgian courts, regardless of where the alleged crimes have taken place.
A pardon is a government decision to allow a person to be relieved of some or all of the legal consequences resulting from a criminal conviction. A pardon may be granted before or after conviction for the crime, depending on the laws of the jurisdiction.
An ex post facto law is a law that retroactively changes the legal consequences of actions that were committed, or relationships that existed, before the enactment of the law. In criminal law, it may criminalize actions that were legal when committed; it may aggravate a crime by bringing it into a more severe category than it was in when it was committed; it may change the punishment prescribed for a crime, as by adding new penalties or extending sentences; it may extend the statute of limitations; or it may alter the rules of evidence in order to make conviction for a crime likelier than it would have been when the deed was committed.
Pauline Nyiramasuhuko is a Rwandan politician who was the Minister for Family Welfare and the Advancement of Women. She was convicted of having incited troops and militia to carry out rape during the Rwandan genocide of 1994. She was tried for genocide and incitement to rape as part of the "Butare Group" at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania. In June 2011, she was convicted of seven charges and sentenced to life imprisonment. Nyiramasuhuko is the first woman to be convicted of genocide by the ICTR, and the first woman to be convicted of genocidal rape.
The Gacaca courts were a system of transitional justice in Rwanda following the 1994 genocide. The term 'gacaca' can be translated as 'short grass' referring to the public space where neighborhood male elders (abagabo) used to meet to solve local problems. The name of this system was then adopted in 2001 as the title of the state's new criminal justice system "Gacaca Courts" to try those deemed responsible for the 1994 Rwandan genocide where over an estimated 500,000 people were killed, tortured and raped. In 1994, the United Nations Security Council created the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda to try high-ranking government and army officials accused of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. The Gacaca Courts were established in law in 2001, began to operate on a trial basis in 2002 and eventually came to operate as trials throughout the country by early 2007. The Gacaca courts were presented as a method of transitional justice, claimed by the Rwandan government to promote communal healing and rebuilding in the wake of the Rwandan Genocide. Rwanda has especially focused on community rebuilding placing justice in the hands of trusted citizens.
International criminal law (ICL) is a body of public international law designed to prohibit certain categories of conduct commonly viewed as serious atrocities and to make perpetrators of such conduct criminally accountable for their perpetration. The core crimes under international law are genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and the crime of aggression.
Désiré Munyaneza is a Rwandan businessman and convicted war criminal who was living in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, before being imprisoned. He is the first man to be arrested and convicted in Canada on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity, for his role in the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. He was sent to jail in October 2009.
The Völkerstrafgesetzbuch, abbreviated VStGB, is a German law that regulates crimes against (public) international law. It allows cases to be brought against suspects under international criminal law provisions, meaning that suspects can be prosecuted even though both they and their victims are foreigners and the crime itself took place abroad.
Case Concerning the Arrest Warrant of 11 April 2000 (Democratic Republic of the Congo v Belgium) [2002] ICJ 1 was a public international law case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) with a judgment issued on 14 February 2002.
Major Bernard Ntuyahaga is a Rwandan army officer convicted by a Belgian court for the murders of ten United Nations peacekeepers at the start of the Rwandan Genocide. He was released in 2018 and returned against his will to Rwanda.
Father Wenceslas Munyeshyaka is a Rwandan priest working in France who was convicted of genocide by a Rwandan military court. Munyeshyaka was pursued in the French courts but in October 2015 the case was not continued because of the quality of the evidence. Despite the controversy and his Rwandan conviction he has been employed as a priest in France since 2001.
Sister Maria Kisito, born Julienne Mukabutera is a Rwandan Benedictine nun who was convicted and sentenced to 12 years for her active role in the deaths of an estimated 500 to 700 hundred people who sought refuge at their convent in southern Rwanda during the Rwandan genocide.
Joint criminal enterprise (JCE) is a legal doctrine used during war crimes tribunals to allow the prosecution of members of a group for the actions of the group. This doctrine considers each member of an organized group individually responsible for crimes committed by group within the common plan or purpose. It arose through the application of the idea of common purpose and has been applied by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia to prosecute political and military leaders for mass war crimes, including genocide, committed during the Yugoslav Wars 1991–1999.
The International Criminal Court investigation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo or the situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is an ongoing investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC) into crimes committed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) during the Second Congo War and its aftermath, including the Ituri and Kivu conflicts. The war started in 1998 and despite a peace agreement between combatants in 2003, conflict continued in the eastern parts of the country for several years. In April 2004 the government of the DRC formally referred the situation in the Congo to the International Criminal Court, and in June 2004, prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo, formally opened an investigation. To date, arrest warrants have been issued for:
Justin Mugenzi is a Rwandan former politician who served as chairman of the Liberal Party and Minister of Commerce during the 1994 Rwandan genocide. He was born in Rukara Commune, Kibungo Province. In 2011 he was convicted, along with Prosper Mugiraneza, of conspiracy to commit genocide and incitement to genocide by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). The convictions were reversed on appeal.
Kunti Kamara, a.k.a. Kunti Kumara, Kunti K., Colonel Kamara, CO Kamara or Co Kamara, whose real name may be Awaliho Soumaworo, is a former Liberian rebel militia commander who participated in the First Liberian Civil War as a leader in the United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy (ULIMO).
References
- 1 2 Rwandan nuns jailed for 1994 massacre, 8 June 2001, CNN, Retrieved 1 March 2016
- 1 2 Belgium's First Application of Universal Jurisdiction: The Butare Four, 1 J. Int'l Crim. Just. 428 (2003)