| Page 88 | International Justice Tribune

Military shambles

07 February 2005 by our correspondent

Over the last few years, speed and firmness have been the official watchwords at hearings before the Arusha Tribunal. Yet, both are sorely lacking in Military II trial which involves the former chief of staff of the army, General Augustin Bizimungu, the former chief of staff of the gendarmerie, General Augustin Ndindiliyimana, the former commander of the reconnaissance battalion Major François-Xavier Nzuwonemeye, and his second in command, Captain Innocent Sagahutu.

article

All defendants boycott trials at special court

07 February 2005 by KELVIN LEWIS

The youthful interim leader of the former Rebel Revolutionary United Front (RUF) movement, the self-styled General Issa Sesay, has ordered his former battle group commander Morris Kallon to join him and all the other defendants in the ongoing war crimes trials in Sierra Leone to boycott court hearings.

article

Could France have ignored Operation Condor?

07 February 2005 by PIERRE ABRAMOVICI

French investigating judge Sophie Clément could over the next few weeks order former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet to appear before the Paris criminal court for his alleged involvement in the disappearance of several French nationals in Chile and Argentina at the end of the 1970s (see IJT 14). The trial in absentia raises the question of the connection between France and Operation Condor, the joint effort by the South American military regimes to eliminate their political opponents.

article

Van Anraat and the chemical solution

20 December 2004 by HEIKELKINA VERRIJN STUART

Dutchman Frans Van Anraat recently declared in a television interview that his deliveries of chemical substances to Iraq was just something he had done on the side. He had received a request from Iraq and had successfully delivered. Had he not done it, somebody else would have, he said. At the time, the Dutch public prosecutor had contemplated charging him with export violations, but since the crimes took place in the late 1980s, it was too late. The crimes would be considered prescriptible. On 6 December, 2004, the businessman was arrested and charged with complicity in genocide and war crimes.

article

Report on torture does not close a chapter

20 December 2004 by INGRID SEYMAN

They are 35,000 men and women, imprisoned under the regime of General Pinochet, who were abused, tortured or raped, then silenced and forgotten by the Chilean institutions and courts. In early December, the publication of the report on Torture and Political Imprisonment under the military dictatorship has finally put an end to the denial of these crimes by granting them official recognition as victims of the dictatorship.

article

Councillor Rutaganira strikes a good deal

20 December 2004 by Thierry Cruvellier

At the beginning of the New Year, if the judges at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) stick to the terms of the agreement between the defence and the prosecutor, Vincent Rutaganira can consider himself a lucky man. On 8 December, the former district councillor of a small town in western Rwanda not only became the fourth Rwandan to plead guilty before a UN court. He will also be distinguished by the unprecedented conditions in which the prosecutor accepted his confession.

article

Test trial in Lumumbashi

06 December 2004 by David Lewis

Back from his visit to this isolated town in the south-eastern province of Katanga, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Colonel Mbombo Nzadi seems satisfied. He considers that "it was essential for us to speak to the people on the ground and better understand the circumstances" and therefore that the visit by the tribunal "has helped".

article

Military trial: chronicle of a crisis foretold

06 December 2004 by André-Michel

Once more, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) is walking on very thin ice. Not only is it reeling from having lost an entire year in the Government I trial, but serious problems now threaten to short-circuit the Military I trial.

article

Unlikely Conspiracy

06 December 2004 by our correspondent

Nothing seems to be going right for the Government I trial at the Arusha Tribunal. The trial, which began a year ago, was adjourned after six months, and then, in October, the Appeals Chamber ordered it to start again from scratch before a new panel of judges. Today, it is the focus of renewed battles between defence teams and the prosecutor's office.

article

French court closes Brazzaville Beach case

06 December 2004 by Arnoud Grellier

On 22 November, judges at the Paris Appeals Court threw out all proceedings related to the disappearances at the Brazzaville Beach port. In doing so, they have probably buried the case for good. They also spared Congo-Brazzaville's leaders from prosecution for their alleged role in the disappearance of 353 refugees sailing into the Brazzaville port from the Democratic Republic of Congo in May 1999.

Pages