Greetings from suprisingly-sunny Belfast!

I arrived in Belfast on June 4th and began working at the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ). I am living with a wonderful housemate in an area of east Belfast called Ballyhackamore and I am very happy here! I spent the first week or so adjusting to the time change (+5hrs), resting after a whirlwind (and amazing) trip to Tanzania with the Crowley program, finging my way around town, and getting settled into my job.

Working at CAJ has been a real pleasure so far. The people in Northern Ireland (NI) are sweet and friendly beyond belief and are quick to help with anything I need. My main task at CAJ is to work on their campaign for a Bill of Rights for NI. A Bill of Rights was promised in the Belfast Good Friday Agreement in 1998 at the close of the Troubles. It's been a long and difficult road for the proposed Bill of Rights sense then and NI is still left out in the cold without this important constitutional safeguard. Britain doesn't have a Bill of Rights either- so it goes without a written constitution- but from a strictly US perspective a Bill of Rights is a foundational document that not only protects citizens from the government and from each other, but also defines the values of the society. This is particularly important for a post-conflict, and still divided, society. As it stands now, the recent consultation on a Bill of Rights put out by the Northern Ireland Office (NIO) is a giant step backwards for the campaign and has caused great distress and frustration in the community and voluntary sector. So this issue will be my focus for this summer...

On a different note, I had the great pleasure of being in Derry for the release of Saville's Bloody Sunday Report. The day was imbued with not only a potent sense of history and memory, but also with the current tensions and painst that linger over thirty plus years of intimacy with conflict. The momen I'm guessing everyone will continue to talk about is when the victims' familites, who read and were briefed on the report summary before the rest of the public, reached their hands out the windows of the church above the waiting crowd and gave the thumbs-up...the crowd of thousands erupted into shouts of joy and ecstatic applause. Essentially the report stated that there was absolutely no justification for the shooting of civilians by the British on Bloody Sunday--the key words being that the shootings were unjustified and unjustifable. I recommend reading up on this particular even and inquiry for anyone interested in issues surrounding societies in post-conflict situations and "dealign with the past."

Overall my time in Belfast has been wonderful so far. I'm really enjoying living here, getting the needed break from NYC (sorry--but it's true!) and gaining some great perspective on NI. I promise to update this blog more frequently...safe travels everyone and happy summer!

Mambo!

Almost a month has passed since I first arrived in the Arusha airport and was whisked away to the town center in a UN van full of interns and armed guards carrying AK-47s. I have quickly become accustomed to the lizards in my shower and bumpy dirt roads, and am even picking up Swahili, although it took longer to grow used to my restricted mobility and independence due to how dangerous Arusha has become.
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Work has been busy on the Karemera case. Last week I was able to sit in court, this time on the other side of the soundproof viewing window, beside the bench in full robe. It turned out to be quite an interesting day to sit in on, as Peter Robinson made his return to raise the contempt issue, and Colonel Théoneste Bagosora appeared to begin his much awaited testimony as defense witness. Bagasora was the former directeur du cabinet in Rwanda's Ministry of Defense in June 1992 and, as the highest authority in the Defense Ministry after the assassination of President Habyarimana, was a key figure in the orchestration of the 1994 massacres in Rwanda. According to Lieutenant General Roméo Dallaire, former Force Commander of the UN Assistance Mission to Rwanda, Bagosora was the “kingpin” behind the genocide, a Hutu extremist who "controlled - as well as anyone could - the genocidal militia." It was Bagosora who introduced Dallaire to the militia leaders in Rwanda, after which Dallaire famously wrote that he had “shaken hands with the devil,” in his book “Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda.” Bagosora was convicted by the ICTR in 2008 for genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, and sentenced to life imprisonment. His case is currently on appeal. Sitting directly in front of Bagosora, just a few feet away, I made eye contact with “either the coldest fish in Africa or the ghost of Machiavelli,” as he was described by Dallaire, a large man impeccably dressed with a nearly expressionless face. I listened to his version of the buildup to the genocide, which he claimed was spontaneous, in line with his defense team’s argument that the Prosecution in his trial failed to prove that the killings were organized and therefore constituted genocide. He spoke in terms of RPF invasion and civil war, and blamed President Kagame for the assassination of President Habyarimana and for the subsequent RPF breach of the Arusha Accords. Reading defense witness transcripts and hearing testimonies like that of Bagosora, the story of Rwanda becomes less clear to me than I had thought it was.
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Before I began my internship, I saw the Rwandan genocide in terms of black and white. Black and white because defining events as crimes works to establish and enforce international legal boundaries, and enables the international community to explain its own failure to stop violations of the crimes prohibited. Black and white because laws reflect the desire to establish a rational causal narrative in the aftermath of gross violence, and trials set out to create such an account to interpret, explain and record the atrocities, and yet must greatly simplify, favoring some voices over others and reducing and repackaging testimony, in order to achieve justice. Black and white because the prosecution of individuals, individual reductionism, can narrow the field of focus, limiting the wider blame and de-contextualizing the crime from its political and institutional roots. However, the more work that I do here at the ICTR, the more transcripts and testimonies that I am exposed to, the more I begin to see what occurred in Rwanda in a million different shades of gray. Gray because I cannot ignore how the naming of the crime of genocide and the prosecution of individuals in criminal trials recreates the past in a sense. Gray because historical narratives are not merely discovered but are at least partially constructed, a process reflective of power and interests and socio-political demands.
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Within these shades of gray, I remember an article I read by Nigel Eltringham, “Debating the Rwandan Genocide,” which cites Roger Smith’s five-part typology and offers an overview of the key motives propagated by perpetrators of genocide, several of which are often-times at work in any given case. According to Smith, genocide may be retributive, monopolistic, utilitarian, institutional, and/or ideological. Just last week I listened to an attorney working in the OTP recount his recent trip to Rwanda; he met a genocide survivor who was raped by so many men that at one point it no longer made sense to her to count. She told him that her child, now about 16 years old, has one thousand fathers. Faced with countless stories like this, it would be tempting to dismiss the violence in Rwanda as the result of pure evil if I were not also faced with stories that speak of compliance with orders to rape and kill out of fear for life and the life of families and loved ones. I find Smith’s categories helpful as I delve further into the Rwandan crisis to understand what happened there any why. Using Smith’s archetypes, the case of Rwanda can be seen to embody elements that were retributive, with the Hutu seeking revenge when their superior role was threatened by the Tutsi, a group seen to have historically subjugated them. It was monopolistic and institutional; the ruling elite was intent on maintaining political hegemony through the slaughter of Tutsi as a group. It was also utilitarian if interpreted as Gerard Prunier has as “among other things, a fight for good jobs, administrative control and economic advantage.” Thus in the Rwandan context, it is important to remember that there was a clear pragmatic component, that also mixed with the ideological or transcendental element which was the focus on racial purity. It is these pragmatic elements and the socio-political context, as with all crimes, which make criminal law and the prosecution of individuals so much more complex. With attention to these various elements, I attempt to reconcile the two sides of the Rwandan story I am faced with here.
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Aside from my work at the ICTR, I get to see a little more of Tanzania each weekend. Last Friday I attended a fundraising event at the Tanzania Millennium Hand Foundation- Tamhiha. Tamiha Foundation is an NGO which provides shelter for widows, most of whom are HIV positive, and orphans. Within the framework of the millennium goals, its twin aims are to train the widows in job skills and microfinance, and to find sponsors for the children’s primary education. During the event, I toured the foundation grounds and orphanage, visited with the women and children, and watched traditional African dance performances. It costs only $ 30 to maintain one child for one month at the orphanage, and sponsoring a child’s primary education is only about $ 600 per year, yet the Tamiha Foundation struggles to find funding.
http://www.tamiha.org/

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On Saturday I went on a day Safari. I was picked up at 7 am in a Landrover and began the drive to Nrongoro with a Nigerian lawyer who works at Shearman and Sterling LLP in NYC and is here for three months as part of a pro-bono program that the firm runs with the OTP. The Nrongoro Conservation Area is a UNESCO World Heritage Site about 112 miles outside of Arusha, initially created by the British in 1951. The Nrongoro Crater is a vast volcanic crater that formed between 2-3 million years ago, home to most of the animal species common to East Africa. After our drive through the forest and descent into the edenic crater, we were able to see lions, cheetahs, wildebeests, hippopotamuses, zebras, buffalos, ostriches, flamingos, rhinos, warthogs, Thomson gazelles, and baboons.



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On our way back down the crater slope, we stopped by a Maasai village composed of a circle of 12 huts with a market in the middle and a kindergarten nearby. The Maasai is a pastoralist tribe that migrated to Kenya and Tanzania from Northern Africa between the fifteenth and eighteenth centuries, during which time they acquired their reputation as fierce warriors. The Maasai lived in the Nrongoro area until they were evicted by the British in the 1950s, but have since been permitted by the Tanzanian government to live and graze cattle there. Maasai society is patriarchal and centers around cattle, the primary source of sustenance and symbol of status and wealth. The tribe is one of Africa’s most well-known, as they have claimed rights to game reserves frequented by tourists in parts of Kenya and Tanzania, and are regarded as photogenic by travelers due in part to the intricate jewelry, Shúkà sheets, and bright colors they are known to wear. The particular Maasai village that we visited has embraced cultural tourism as a means of revenue generation. The chief greeted us in English, which he learned during his five years studying in Moshi and Arusha, and introduced us to his village, encouraging us to join in adumu or aigus, the welcome and jumping dances and song. He then ushered us inside his small home, which was made of wood, sticks, and grass and covered in cow dung for waterproofing. The homes are small, but the families eat, sleep and shelter small cattle there. I was surprised at his openness to questions from us as he described family and marriage customs in the tribe. Men are allowed to marry multiple wives, and marriages and bride-prices are arranged by the parents on both sides. The chief took us to the village market, where each family sells jewelry and crafts. He also took us to the kindergarten to observe instruction, which was given in Maa, Swahili, and English.


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This is a busy week at the ICTR as Bagosora continues his testimony, and I am eager to get downstairs to court to listen in on his cross-examination.
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Until soon,
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Kimber

For more Rwanda in the news: http://www.economist.com/node/16439016?story_id=16439016&fsrc=nlw|wwp|06-24-2010|politics_this_week

First Stop -- Ghana

Germans are remarkably efficient. While at the airport in Frankfurt, en route to Ghana, there was an unnamed “security threat.” A whole wing of the airport was cordoned off by immaculately dressed, tall white police officers. Security tape was erected, the area thoroughly secured and parsed, and within minutes it was back to business as usual.

I arrived in Accra the next day. The contrast was stark. The time it took me to email an attachment – three hours – felt impossibly slow. The glacial speed this country can move at tests the nerves of anyone who is accustomed to immediacy. Just as the wait at the photocopy centre was about to get the better of my nerves, the women assisting me dawned a heart-warming grin, illuminating the room and quelling any frustration that had been fomenting.

Ghanaians are a peaceful people. Over the last two decades they have lived in a relatively stable democracy. Without fail, every Ghanaian I met was overwhelmingly kind. It sounds trite to make sweeping generalisations about the disposition of an entire country, but I really have no reason to think otherwise. Relations amongst Africans and the outside world, however, have been perpetually strained during the colonial and post-colonial era. The Ghanaian sensibility though, which emanates with every glistening smile, has, I think, helped this nation to cope with its plight. One of our professors, Kwame Frimpong, brought the shambok to our first class. This is a long wooden staff, used traditionally for corporal punishment. While corporal punishment has been officially outlawed in Ghana, the practice still exists in rural areas where Common Law holds less sway, and justice is often meted out according to traditional practices. The complexities of the tension between Customary Practice and Common Law was the first topic of study in Comparative Constitutional Law. Rather than introduce the human rights dilemmas arising from corporal punishment through stilted scholarship, Professor Frimpong, in his inimical way, used humour, and jokingly threatened us with the shambok if we didn’t behave. His intention was not to make light of a serious matter, but rather, to tease out the complexities of the ethical issues arising from corporal punishment.

Religion too, plays an important role in Ghanaian society. The devout fervency in which Ghanaians practice Christianity is marveling. Given Christianity’s dubious historical roots in Africa, I find it fascinating that it didn’t crumble under the fall of colonialism. In fact, quite the opposite has occurred. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Ghana, Georgina Wood, to commemorate the beginning of her third year on the bench, invited our class to a church service. Her Ladyship, as I later learned was the correct way to address her, cordially extended a number of invitations to our class to meet her, and some of the other justices on the Supreme Court. The service was used primarily as a means for Her Ladyship to thank God for her extraordinary accomplishments (many scholars attribute her work in reforming the Supreme Court as playing an integral role in the county’s prosperity). During the service we witnessed the central role music and dance play in Ghanaian religious practice. Like glistening smiles and playful humour, the infectious movement caused by music engenders hope. It is this hope, and the understanding that all people deserve the chance to have something to reasonably hope for, that informs her court, and allows for the moral crossroads of law and religion to positively affect justice.

Music and dance are also fundamental to the traditional cultural and spiritual practices of Ghanaians. We visited a small village in the Eastern region of Ghana called Akropong. Here we had the honour of meeting another Chief Justice, Nana, the Chief of Akropong. As we congregated at the palace in Akropong, the talking drum led a six-piece percussion ensemble in culling the needed quorum for our introduction to Nana and the village elders. Nana, which means both chief and grandchild, plays the multifaceted role of spiritual leader, political advisor, and legal arbiter. Ghana’s legal system incorporates traditional Customary Law, which has been the practice of villagers for centuries, into Common Law. Both systems inform each other. Championing human rights for instance, is not part of the Customary conception of justice, and my fellow Ghanaian students were perplexed by the occidental obsession with defending the rights of the convicted. The rights of all people matter deeply though, both philosophically and practically, and nowhere is this better exemplified than the Castles in Cape Coast.

Cape Coast is located in the Central Region of Ghana, hovering the Gulf of Guinea. The Castles are to African Americans, what the concentrations Camps of Eastern Europe are to Jews. They represent humanity at its worst. What we are capable of when human rights are derailed to the point where we equivocate about whom we should grant them to. The Castles were the starting point for the vast majority of Africans brought to North and South America, to work as slaves. Millions died on their journey across the Atlantic, and those who did survive became the first generation of what is the single greatest socio-economic scourge in the United States. The Castles now represent a symbol of hope though. People can now return through the gate of no return, and honour those who never had this privilege.

The next stop is Nepal, whose vast landscape and unknown political future makes it a destination of intrigue the world over. I hope to have much to report over the next ten weeks during my Leitner internship.

Gettin´ Busy (finalmente)

After meeting the conflict resolution program director on Monday, Nick, Steph and I finally moved out of Managua and in the direction of the rural community we will call home for the rest of the summer. Rio Blanco´s blossoming conflict resolution program is now in its capacity building stage so the prospective mediators are engaged in daily training sessions while finishing touches are being put on the office space that will be used to house the mediations.

After much pestering and cajoling on my part, I managed to convince our office to let me tag along with one of our field officers as he motorcycled to rural fincas, or farms, to meet with clients serviced by Nitlapan. We left on his trusty steed bright and early at 8am and didn´t make it back til 7pm.

When Nitlapan advertises itself as a provider of rural legal services, it means very, very rural. We drove for about an hour and a half into the countryside, parked when we ran out of road, and then proceeded to hike hours from finca to finca to meet with the clients.

While my work centers on the conflict resolution program, Nitlapan provides a range of programs from helping rural farmers secure land titles to providing micro-loans with more favorable interest rates than those offered by banks. On this visit I was able to see the breadth of Nitlapan´s activities in action. The field officer I was tailing, Mario, presented one woman with the deed to the land her family has called home and farmed for decades.

Nitlapan helped her create a strong case and compelling application to finally be granted title, an emotional moment this picture fails to capture as she did not seem too comfortable being photographed.

At other farms Mario, an agricultural engineer, assessed the effectiveness of the use of the loan money and offered technical advice to the farmers to improve efficiency. While Mario conducted his business, I was charged with interviewing the farmers and their families to assess the nature of conflicts that may eventually appear before the conflict resolution mediators.

This served the dual purpose of helping the mediators anticipate the types of problems that they will likely face while also advertising the existence of the program, a task made very difficult given how spread out the communities are (evidenced by this pic which has a machete wielding young farmer guiding us on the one hour hike to the next finca in search of a client who was not there!).

Since we have not made our final move to the Rio Blanco offices, my interviewing was not guided by the questionnaire that supposedly exists. Rather, the interviews were informal conversations during which I fielded questions about the program and listened to the problems facing the families. A common theme that emerged was land disputes between neighbors. Litigating these in the courts was inconvenient both for the distance the parties in conflict had to travel and for the wait time before a decision was rendered (anywhere from 3-10 years). I was repeatedly told that given these constraints the parties often resorted to violence. Clearly the need for this conflict resolution to get underway sooner rather than later is tied to much more than my desire to get busy.

Nick, Steph and I will be making our final move to the small town of Rio Blanco on Monday and our days (we are told) will consist of travelling to fincas and interviewing the families. One take away from my interviewing experiences this week are that we should delicately find a way to interview the husbands and wives (and children) in isolation from each other. This was not easy to do this week and as such the topic of domestic abuse did not arise, even though Nitlapan officers are adamant that this is a serious problem. Perhaps having Steph along for the interviews will make speaking to the women alone easier.

I have to head to the end of the week briefing but hopefully next time I write it´ll be from Rio Blanco!

Til then,

John

Human Rights and Customary Law

I came to Sierra Leone planning to assist the Centre for Safe Motherhood, Youth, and Child Outreach in advocacy for community by-laws outlawing female circumcision before the age of 18.  The project built on the work we started through the Walter Leitner Human Rights Clinic, working in three chiefdoms in the Kambia District.  We saw potential in Magbema and Tonko-Limba to pass these laws, sending a message to the reluctant national government.  As is typical in any internship, my work plan has adjusted slightly, but I'm very pleased with how much I'm seeing and learning.

First, for some background:  Female circumcision, also known as female genital mutilation (FGM), is performed around the world, mostly in Africa and Asia.  It is also practiced by immigrant communities in Europe and the United States.  The effects, both physical and emotional, can be devastating and long-lasting, ranging from infection to complications in child birth to death.  Sierra Leone has been described as "ground zero" for anti-FGM advocacy, due to the prevalence of the practice and the national government's silence on the subject.  Approximately 90-95% of women have undergone FGM, mostly as initiation into the bondo, the all-female secret society.  Traditionally, girls went to the bondo to become women-- learning skills for their household, getting dressed in fine clothing, and being circumcised; but over time, the educational aspects have fallen away, leaving only the cutting.  Because the bondo is outside the control of non-members, whether men, government, or foreigners, local politicians have remained silent on FGM.  No national laws have been passed against the practice, and when the Child Rights Act was debated in 2007, the clause addressing FGM was removed after a closed debate.  Politicians will pay for the initiation of girls to win community support, rather than see their campaign derailed by being perceived as opposing the bondo.  As a result, women and children who wish to resist FGM have only the protection of human rights treaties and careful interpretation.

Meeting with Community Members in Kukuna

In spite of the government's response, public opinion has begun to turn against FGM.  Due in large part to human rights sensitization by organizations such as CESMYCO, many communities have expressed their desire to end the practice.  However, the soweis, traditional bondo leaders, speak of their need for alternative employment.  Initiation fees can be $100-200 per girl, in a country where average income is around $100/month.  CESMYCO is addressing this concern by training initiators for Alternative Employment, such as providing seedlings so grounds of women can harvest rice.  As such, there are opportunities to address the legal problem at a local level.  

Under Sierra Leone's constitution, people are governed through the national laws, enforced by the High Court and police, and customary law, promulgated and enforced by the chief and local courts.  Most people, particularly in the villages, rely on the traditional justice system, rather than national laws or human rights treaties.  In recent years, chiefs in Sierra Leone have passed community by-laws addressing human rights violations, such as forced marriage and child labour, guided by the provisions of CEDAW and the CRC.  Some communities, both here and across Africa, have used the opportunity to outlaw FGM, either entirely or at a young age.  Usually these by-laws are more effective since they have been supported by the community and they can be used to advocate for a stronger national response.

With this background, my work this summer is focusing more broadly on the status of women and children's rights in customary law.  I am conducting interviews in communities and in Freetown to research the current by-laws and recent changes.  Through this project, I am seeing how some chiefdoms have incorporated human rights standards, making them directly applicable to the population.  By the end of the summer, I will draw together a report analyzing the gaps in by-laws as compared to human rights and national laws, as well as strategies to advocate for more progressive by-laws.  Since CESMYCO does not currently have a lawyer on staff, I hope the document will guide their efforts to incorporate legal approaches to eradicating FGM.

In my free time, I've been exploring Salone's many beaches.

Although my work can be variable- busy one day, then put on hold by waiting for power- I have found the experience is what I put into it.  As long as I am prepared for the unpredictable and remain focused on the bigger picture, I am able to motivate myself to keep going.  Additionally, I've been able to enjoy my time in Freetown and my brief trips upcountry.  Since the rains will be starting in July (although we've had some incredible thunderstorms), we try to get outside as much as possible-- going to the beach or hiking a nearby mountain.  And, of course, I have been following the World Cup; it would be impossible not to.  I'm going to disagree with Jessica on this point-- at least for this World Cup, there is nowhere quite like Africa.  Although Sierra Leone is not competing, every bar, radio, or television is broadcasting every game, and the quickest way to make friends in a shared taxi is to ask everyone who their team is.  Though most of the African teams will not advance beyond the group stage, we are all holding out hope in Ghana and looking for a home continent victory.

My trip To Bunce Island

Part of my reason for wanting to come to Sierra Leone and work for the summer was its rich history; particularly the history that is found in Freetown. Freetown received its name because it is where the British brought the "Black Loyalists" who assisted them fighting in the US Revolutionary War. Choosing Freetown as the site to settle the former slaves was not a decision that was made "by chance." For many many years Sierra Leone had been the hub of the slave trade. This past weekend I went to Bunce Island, Sierra Leone's Slave Port, to see its rich history.

There are a few things that make Bunce Island unique from many of the other slave castles. First, and very significant to American History is that at the other Slave Castles (ie Cape Coast in Ghana), only about 4% of the slaves ended up in America. However, this was not the case for Bunce, where the majority of the slaves were taken to what is now the United States. These slaves were settled primarily in Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina. In fact, if you go to the Gullah Islands of South Carolina, you will hear the peopl speaking Krio, the language spoken in Sierra Leone.

When we arrived at Bunce, we were extremely fortunate because the world's leading expert on the history of the island, Professor Joseph Opala, was shooting a documentary there with NBC. We got the best imaginable tour. The slave compound on the island was not preserved the way that the other slave forts are, but the island is also not inhabited, so many of the ruins are fairly well preserved. It was like walking into a time capsule. What an amazing site.

My trip there reminded me that there is so much to see and experience here and I should take advantage of as much of it as possible.

Kia Ora, Week 3: Families torn apart by Family Reunification policy

He was granted residence and then citizenship in New Zealand. A prize case of escaping desperate life threatening circumstances, fleeing from Somalia to eastern Ethiopia, and eventually making it to NZ through immigration policy. Two of his brothers went missing and are presumed dead. The four nieces all went missing and are presumed to have been sold into sex slavery or dead. His one remaining brother was watching over three of his nephews. Last week his phone rang. The caller told him that his brother was now dead. These three nephews, aged 8-10 are somewhere in Addis Ababa. He wants to bring them to New Zealand to safety. But in terms of NZ immigration policy, they're not a "family" so that won't be so easy. Also, he came to NZ under the wrong policy if he wanted any chance of bringing his family over with him.

This week I have felt especially touched by our clients that I have met but realized there will not be a way within New Zealand immigration policy to help them. I knew that it would come to this in certain, maybe many, cases, and it is sometimes simple to think about immigration policy as this abstract concept that in the United States becomes an issue of politics and in New Zealand becomes an issue for the Minister of Immigration, Hon. Jonathan Coleman, and Immigration New Zealand ("INZ") having basically free reign from Parliament to do what they wish with policy.

There were previously two ways to come to NZ as a refugee:

1) UNHCR Quota

The United Nations High Commission for Refugees ("UNHCR") advises New Zealand on the countries from which NZ should accept the most refugees. The Minister and INZ have set the quota at 750 refugees to be accepted annually, and they pick and choose which countries they want to prioritize: http://www.refugeeservices.org.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0019/955/Nationalities_to_2008

See the link above for a breakdown of these priority countries.

Refugees who entered NZ under the quota are eligible to sponsor their family members left behind to make it to NZ under a special family reunification residence policy.

2) INZ Humanitarian Policy

This is the policy the client I discussed early used. Prior to October 2001, New Zealand had a "Humanitarian Category" under their Residence policy where they basically accepted more people where "severe humanitarian conditions exist" and the individual had a close family connection to New Zealand. Many people came to New Zealand under the benefits of this policy. At the time, refugees who entered NZ under the Humanitarian policy were eligible to sponsor their family members left behind to make it to NZ under a separate family reunification residence policy. In October 2001, the Humanitarian option of entry was eliminated. Unless the person managed to get a spot in the quota of 750, there is no place for her in New Zealand. This also meant that there was no family reunification option if a refugee entered under the Humanitarian policy.

Refugees fear for their lives, their safety, their health, their most basic needs, their families. They are desperate for help, and it is a beautiful thing that New Zealand, by the urging of the UNHCR, accepts refugees. A desperate person in this situation is not thinking about picking and choosing which policy they apply to officially enter the country under, but through their current policy this is essentially what New Zealand says these people should have been doing.

If you entered under policy one, you have a chance at living together as family again. If you entered under policy two, your family will be never be together again.

Try explaining that to your client. Or, actually, think about how it would feel to be that client.

Greetings from Nicaragua!

This will have to be short and sweet as the internet here has been incredibly unreliable, a theme we find to be consistent with the NGO world at large in Nicaragua. We are here to work with Nitlapan, an NGO that offers legal services to rural communities. Nitlapan covers various legal bases, ranging from helping farmers secure loans to advocating on behalf of the "landless," farmers who were granted land, but not title, in the agrarian reform following the revolution. About a month ago Nitlapan launched its first conflict resolution program in the rural municipality of Matagalpa. This is the program our internships revolve around.

We arrived two weeks ago and have been in a bit of a state of limbo. Upon arriving we were greeted by Nitlapan's chief counsel and given an overview of the group's mission, practices, and our role in helping implement the conflict resolution program. Our responsibilities will include researching the nature and frequency of conflicts in the rural town of Rio Blanco through client intake and personal interviews with members of the community. Thus far we have received a lot of background information and general information; however, the head of the program has been travelling to the different communities and we have been left waiting to meet him. This has resulted in a ton of down time and waiting, which we have filled with background reading and research. We are scheduled to meet the program director on Monday and finish our training, so hopefully we will start interviewing clients on Tuesday!

As interesting as it is to be a part of a new program, we have been disappointed by the lack of organization surrounding its implementation. Despite the disorganization we have had a great time getting to know Nicaraguans and seeing more of the country. Nitlapan has welcomed us with open arms and so long as the program director actually makes it on Monday, it seems that our work will be challenging and interesting.

Hasta la proxima,
Juan, Estefani, y Nicolas

Update from the Hotline for Migrant Workers

שלום לכולם!
Last week, another intern and I went with a lawyer from the legal department to a hearing at a courthouse in Petah Tikva. The case had to do with a new “unwritten policy” of the Ministry of the Interior regarding migrant workers. The policy is that if a migrant worker marries another migrant worker, or gets pregnant, then the worker's visa is canceled and he or she is deported. The client that the Hotline was representing, with the help of ACRI (Association for Civil Rights in Israel), was a nearly eight-months-pregnant woman who had recently been released from a detention center (with our help). Now, we were arguing that she should be given a visa that lasts at least three months from the due date, so that she can get health benefits and receive medical care here. The lawyer for the state – who, by the way, seemed slightly inexperienced – argued that she should only be given a visa up until her deportation hearing. The judge, who was more argumentative than either of the lawyers, kept talking over the government lawyer and saying things like “if you didn't always postpone the hearings another two weeks, another two weeks, then maybe this would already be solved, but I'm not going to deport a woman about to go into labor!”

Needless to say, the lawyer for the state failed her case and our client can stay. Unfortunately, it seems like the unwritten policy is still in force unless we can get a higher court to strike it down, or the Knesset (parliament) to specifically protect migrant workers against something like this happening again. In Israel, the current ministers of the Knesset lean toward the right, but the Supreme Court is a holdout for the liberals (kind of the opposite of the USA) so we usually have better luck with judges.

One funny thing about the day was the way people dressed. In Israel, almost no one wears suits, ever. People wear crocs to weddings. But in court, the lawyers are supposed to wear a suit and tie under a formal black robe that looks almost like a graduation gown. However, since no one really cares for formality, one of the lawyers was wearing dark jeans under his robe, and none of the lawyers actually wore suits. (After all, as one pointed out, you can't really tell with the robe on top – and it's hot out!)

On Thursday, the other legal intern and I, plus a group of 6 other future volunteers, got trained to visit the detention center near Tel Aviv and to interview asylum seekers and migrant workers who are housed there while the government decides what their status is. This Thursday, we're all going down to the detention center together for our first interviewing session – so I'll write more about all this after we go!

In the mean time, I'm still enjoying my time here, aside from the ridiculous heat and humidity. (Today it's 40ºC although probably no competition with those of you who are even closer to the equator). This week I'm visiting the Nalagaat center, a non-profit organization that provides a stage for blind and deaf actors and has an attached restaurant where patrons are served food in total pitch-black darkness. (http://www.nalagaat.org.il/home.php) Can't wait!

L'hitraot! (See you later!)
-Laura

First Experiences at the United Nations Office of the Special Envoy for Haiti

Since assuming my role as a legal intern for the United Nations Office of the Special Envoy for Haiti, I have had only cutting edge experiences, as the Haiti reconstruction and recovery effort is in full force this summer. Specifically, I have supported, and continue to support, the work of my supervisor, the private sector policy advisor to the Special Envoy, and contribute to economic development initiatives and property rights research, generally. I am fortunate to have a supervisor who fully exposes me to his work and offers me the opportunity to assist with a variety of important efforts. I have drafted work products intended for the Special Envoy, reviewed and edited contracts, and attended meetings with former government administration aids, corporations, public sector organizations, and UN and international financial agencies. I look forward to the work that awaits me daily and continuing to share my experiences.

Making the Best of It :)

The last few weeks in Sierra Leone have been far better than the first. It took me a few days to realize that my summer experience cannot revolve completely around my internship and I began to explore the country.

I woke up at 4:30am last Friday and took a government bus, which is very much like a Greyhound Bus, to a town 5 hours away named "Bo". The plan was to meet up with a few American Interns and watch the US play England in the World Cup. Although it was only the 5 us and about 7 Peace Corp Volunteers rooting for America against about 70 England fans, we had a great time. I decided after that weekend that everyweekend, I would travel to a different place in the country so that I would have the experiences.

My work with the internship has not gotten any better, but I have done a few things. First, I have gotten some of the other interns to share their projects with me, and this has allowed me to do a lot of research about the laws and customs of Sierra Leone. I have also met with someone inside of the President's office who is looking for a way for me to get involved in another project. Timap for Justice does very important work. Unfortunately, I believe that that important work is done outside of Freetown, where I am stationed. I have not given up though, I intend to visit all of their sites this summer. I believe that this summer experience is going to be what I make of it, and I plan to make the best of it.

Peace

European Roma Rights Centre - Budapest, Hungary

Hi Everyone!

I am rounding at week 3 of my internship at the European Roma Rights Center in Budapest. It's been a fascinating time, and the people I work with and for are wonderful. The ERRC has both a legal department and programs department that work together to raise awareness of Roma rights issues both in the Roma community and the rest of Europe. They have also brought several lawsuits alleging human rights abuses against the Roma by different European governments. I have been working on organizing the case-file of a very important case, D.H. and Others v. Czech Republic, which the ERRC fought and won against the Czech government in 2007. (The full case can be read on the European Court of Human Rights website in their HUDOC database, for some reason I'm having trouble pasting the link). The gist of the case is that 18 students in the Czech republic were placed in schools for children with mental disabilities and were being educated there as though they had mental disabilities. The real reason they were placed there is because they were Romani - none of them had any mental or learning disabilities. The case was lost at the section level, but won at the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights. It was a landmark case not only for the ERRC but also for Romani students everywhere.

Unfortunately, this type of discrimination against Roma is commonplace in Europe. I find it very difficult to explain to Americans just how serious the intensity of the racism against the Roma in Europe really is. Notwithstanding some important differences, the racism, abuse, and discrimination the Roma experience everyday in Europe is on par with the way African-Americans were treated in America prior to (and even after) the Civil Rights Movement. I have been most astonished with the way that this treatment affects Romani children - they are more susceptible than white children to being lured into human-trafficking, they are siphoned off into de facto segregated schools with the lowest quality of education, they are prone to bullying and violence from white children and adults, they have a higher drop-out rate than white children, and the list goes on. I read an article today about a 13 year-old Romani boy in Bulgaria who was shot in the head by a neighbor because the neighbor was tired of the noise the Romani children were making outside - the lives of Romani children are in danger simply because of their ethnicity.

I could go on about the problems that the Roma are still dealing and have been for centuries. The difficult part for me about all of this is that because anti-tsiganism (the term for racism against Roma in many countries in Eastern Europe) is so prevalent throughout European society, it receives very little coverage in the press. I have read several articles written about the "Roma Invasion" (as though they were insects or varmin) of some areas of countries where there weren't many Roma before - even the press conveys a sense of disgust at the very sight of Roma communities. I really believe that if Americans had any idea what the reality was over here, it may shock them into pressuring European governments for reform.

Anyways, for now I am organizing the case I mentioned and working on getting it into an online system that the ERRC will be able to easily access in the future. In addition to that, I'm also doing some other things - editing articles for the ERRC website, doing some research, etc.

Which brings me to playtime! There's nothing quite as amazing as watching World Cup games in Europe. It's electric! That's the only way to describe it. Also, Budapest is just a really beautiful city in general. The architecture is so strange - a combination of faux-gothic buildings that were erected in 1898 for a huge meet-up of the world's leaders, mixed with some remnants from the communist era. All in all, Budapest is extremely colorful, both literally and culturally. The food is...well, it's not good. But the beer is great, and it's really cheap. The weather has been amazing. I know Budapest isn't everyone's ideal European destination, but if you get a chance, it doesn't disappoint. I'm really lucky to be in such a beautiful city at such an exciting time. I'm especially lucky to be at the ERRC. Please check out their website (http://www.errc.org/) - there are always articles posted about current events in the Roma community, including things that ERRC is currently working on and has worked on in the past. It is a fascinating and essential issue for the human rights agenda.

I hope everyone is well in their respective corners of the world!

Peace from Hungary!

Jessica Parra

First days

I begin the internship today. I'm really happy. I had some meetings with the lawyer who is going to supervise my work and we're deciding the concrete issue of my summer work. The case is huge and there are a lot of things to do!

My Summer Internship & ICTR in the News

My Summer Internship at the ICTR:
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The purpose of the ICTR Internship Programme is to provide participants specialized in fields relevant to the work of the Tribunal with practical experience to complement their field of study, and to enhance understandings of how the ICTR attempts to find international solutions to problems posed by massive episodes of violence.
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My interest in the historical context of the violence in Rwanda and the subsequent prosecutions of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide developed during my undergraduate studies. Having a special interest in advocacy on behalf of gender and sexual violence victims, I was especially interested in the mass sexual violence systematically perpetrated against Tutsi women in Rwanda that constituted a key element of the ethnically charged conflict. Within the span of the 100 days of genocide in 1994, thousands of women were raped and held in groups as sexual slaves, often times raped to death and left nude and in public view, as part of the hate propaganda that demonized Tutsi women’s sexuality and further fueled the violence. The ICTR is groundbreaking in its attempt to establish international justice through prosecution of sexual violence. The ICTR’s opportunity to do so, however, has in many ways fallen short, and I would like to learn more about how the international justice process can make the prosecution of sexual violence a greater priority in the future, and how it can better attain justice and provide care and protection for rape survivors and victims in such cases of massive conflict.
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More generally, I am also eager to develop a better understanding of the opportunities in the future for international efforts to establish truth, justice, and reconciliation in the aftermath of genocide and mass violence through my experience at the ICTR and through my interaction with its policies and programmes. Furthermore, I am interested in understanding the ongoing development of residual issues that arise as the ICTR prepares to close, including arrangements for the trial of fugitives arrested after the ICTR closes, the transfer of current cases to national jurisdictions, the fate of those convicted by the tribunal and of the remaining eleven fugitives, the preservation of evidence, the storage of archives, and the development and location of an inevitable residual mechanism of the Tribunal. It is in these last months of the ICTR’s mandate that lessons learned from its decade and a half of operation will crystallize as the international community attempts to find the best way to address international crimes in the future so that the slaughter of thousands in Rwanda will not have been in vain.
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I will complete my internship in the Chambers Legal Support Section, which is part of the Registry branch of the ICTR. This summer I have been assigned to Chambers III to work on the Karemera et al. case, the most notorious current case at the ICTR. A section of Chamber III sits on the case composed of Judge Charles Michael Dennis Byron of Saint Kitts and Nevis, presiding, who has also served as President of the ICTR since 2007, Judge Gberdao Gustave Kam of Burkina Faso, and Judge Vagn Joensen of Denmark. The Karemera et al. trial has gone on since 2001, its complexity evidenced by the fact that it is the source of 90% of all ICTR motions. It has come to focus on three alleged architects of the genocide: Édouard Karemera, former Minister of the Interior, Joseph Nzirorera, former President of the National Assembly, and Matthieu Ngirumpatse, former President of the Mouvement républicain national pour la démocratie et le développement (MRND). After 300 trial days, 50 remain, and the case is at its most crucial stage from the chambers’ perspective: the end of the close of the defense’s evidence, and the start of the decision drafting.
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Much of my internship will involve legal research and writing. In particular, I will be preparing memoranda, summarizing witness testimonies, analyzing party submissions, and drafting judgments on motions. In the first two weeks, I have undergone general training on the history and development of the ICTR, its structure, and the goals and challenges of each branch. Additionally, I have also completed substantive training focused on the crimes charged in the Karemera et al. indictment, including genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, direct and public incitement to commit genocide, and complicity in genocide. Also covered were rape and extermination as crimes against humanity, and violence to health and physical or mental well-being and murder as violations of common article III. Substantive training also focused on forms of liability relevant to the indictment, including individual criminal responsibility, joint criminal enterprise, and command responsibility.
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Last week, I began my first witness assignment. My typical workday involves waking up early to a cold shower, and taking a 200 schilling dala-dala ride to town on a minivan packed with at least 15 local people sitting on each others’ laps driven down routes created by the drivers as they go. At the ICTR compound- which at seven stories high was until recently the tallest building in Arusha- I share an office with four other interns in the Chambers section. For now, I spend my work days reading witness transcripts, flagging parts relevant to the indictment, entering in relevant facts to the ICTR Chambers database, and composing witness summaries that highlight the witness’ relationship to the accused, and potential impeachment issues.
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When trials are in session, interns are able to sit in the viewing section for observation. This morning I did so, as the Appeals Chamber has come down from The Hague to hear two appeals at the ICTR this week. I sat in on the defense’s oral argument in the appeal of Callixte Kalimanzira vs. Prosecutor. The defense counsel opened by referring to the arrest of Peter Erlinder, which I will discuss below, and expressing his concern for ramifications of the arrest for all ICTR defense counsel. Some of the points that he further made are common of defense appeals at the ICTR. First, he addressed witness credibility issues, specifically noting that many of the prosecution’s witnesses are being held in poor conditions in jails in Rwanda, where the implication of former authorities in confessions is seen by many as their only way out as it is encouraged by Rwandan authorities. Defense counsel also argued that the Prosecution did not put Kalimanzira on sufficient notice of the charges against him. He argued that given the Prosecution’s significantly greater period of investigation of the charges against Kalimanzira (8 years) as well as the Prosecution’s disproportionately expansive resources and funding (estimated budget several times that provided for defense), the vagueness of the indictment and pre-trial submissions is not acceptable.
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ICTR in the News:
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The talk of the town for the last two weeks has most definitely been the arrest of Peter Erlinder- an American lawyer at the ICTR who served as defense counsel in the Military I case and who currently serves as counsel on the appeal- on May 28th in Rwanda, where he is being held for denying and minimizing genocide- a crime under Rwandan law- and for spreading rumors likely to threaten national security. Last Monday, Mr. Erlinder was denied bail, and it was determined that he will spend the next 30 days in jail in Rwanda until his trial begins.
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Mr. Erlinder’s trip last month to Rwanda was unrelated to his duties at the ICTR, and was made to represent opposition leader Victoire Ingabire, a presidential candidate who returned from exile recently to contest the August presidential election and who has also been charged with negation of genocide. His arrest and charges, however, allegedly stem from his public statements and writings, which criticize the ICTR for failing to prosecute crimes by the RPF within its jurisdiction, and which implicate President Kagame and other members of the current government in playing a role in shooting down the presidential plane in 1994, which he argues triggered the genocide.
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Last week, Peter Robinson, arguably the most famous defense attorney at the ICTR currently serving as lead counsel for Joseph Nzirorera (one of the three accused on the Karemera et al. case to which I am assigned), moved to withdraw as counsel, and called for delay in his client’s trial until the grounds for the arrest of Mr. Erlinder are clarified by the Rwandan authorities. Mr. Robinson claims that fear of potential arrest by other ICTR attorneys may hinder their ability to represent their clients. Mr. Robinson, among others, argues that Mr. Erlinder’s arrest was related to his work at the ICTR, and therefore threatens the work of all defense counsel at the Tribunal. If so, this would violate Article 28 of the ICTR Statute, which ensures states’ cooperation with the investigation of cased for trial at the ICTR. It would also violate the Memorandum of Understanding, which establishes cooperation between the ICTR and Rwanda, and ensures immunity for ICTR defense counsel in their investigations and freedom of movement and action in Rwanda. The Tribunal, however, is not in agreement with Mr. Robinson, and fails to see the link between Mr. Erlinder’s arrest and potential hindrances to Mr. Robinson’s ability to represent his client, and thus last week initiated contempt proceedings against him.
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The ICTR has clearly taken a cautious position, demonstrating a willingness to believe that the arrest of Mr. Erlinder was indeed personal, and not linked to his work at the ICTR. On May 31, the ICTR sent an official note verbal to the Rwandan authorities, requesting clarification of the grounds for Mr. Erlinder’s arrest, specifically whether it is related to his stance taken in defense of his client at the ICTR. The Prosecutor General of Rwanda responded on June 2 that Mr. Erlinder’s arrest was not related to his duties at the ICTR, and the government of the Rwanda pledged to comply with the Memorandum of Understanding. If this is the case, Article 28 cannot properly be invoked against Rwanda, and there would not be grounds for reporting Rwanda to the UN Security Council for noncompliance. The Tribunal finds support for its cautious stance on the matter in the fact that defense teams have, and continue to, travel to Rwanda to investigate their cases without interference by the Rwandan authorities. Furthermore, Mr. Erlinder is clearly not an average ICTR defense attorney, as he has made many public statements about his views on the genocide and ICTR prosecutions, is a published author. Furthermore, before his arrest, he had filed suit against President Kagame for wrongful death of the former presidents of Rwanda and Burundi who died in the 1994 plane crash.
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Today I read the High Court of Gasabo decision in Public Prosecutor v. Erlinder, 11 June 2010, which concluded that the Prosecutor’s grounds for the charges against Mr. Erlinder have merit and are supported by evidence. The most problematic section in my opinion is where it states that Mr. Erlinder “denied and minimized the genocide in Military I, in which he was ICTR Defense Counsel” and did so “by stating that the soldiers he was defending neither planned nor carried out the genocide.” Although the decision goes on to focus on other incidents of negationism found in Mr. Erlinder’s public statements and writings, the explicit link made between his denial of genocide and work as ICTR defense counsel is very troubling. I expect, however, that the ICTR will maintain its cautious stance until more concrete evidence arises to suggest that his arrest and charges stem directly from his work at the ICTR.

Kia Ora, Week 2: Natural Beauty and a Rich Maori History

I'm on my way to quickly adjusting to life here in Wellington. The walk down this hill each morning

is beautiful and very much a job

for my Nikes as I carry my stilettos to work in my bag. I'm becoming more accustomed to life here. The pace of the city is so relaxed and generally without stress, a stark chan

ge from the hustle and bustle of Manhattan life. Nobody seems to be in much of a hurry, and the rhythm of the way of life is mellow. It's a refreshing change and definitely something I am grateful to have a chance to experience. New York is still in my heart though, of course.

At work at the Wellington Community Law Centre, I take on more responsibilities each day. Last week I began researching ways that our centre can be more receptive to the needs of the Maori community. New Zealand ("Aotearoa" meaning "the land of the long white cloud") is a bicultural society. While there are many more than just two cultures here today, from a historic perspective the original inhabitants of Aotearoa were the Maori, Polynesian occupants of the land since the estimated 10th -11th centuries. It was not until the early 19th century that European settlers came to Aotearoa, and so was born what is known as the Pākehā culture today. The term is used generally used to refer to those of European, non-Maori descent today. On 6 February 1840, the Treaty of Waitangi between the British Crown and a substantial number of Maori chiefs establishing rights for the Maori people in the eyes of the Crown and sacrificing some degree of Maori sovereignty or governance. There is still dispute as to what exactly the Treaty indicated because of mistranslation with the language barrier. The Crown believed that the Maori agreed to Crown sovereignty, but the Maori chiefs agreed only to Crown governance, maintaining a degree of autonomy over their own affairs. Within the judicial system today, there is a separate specialized court system for Maori land affairs. The Wellingon Town Hall pictured at left is a perfect example of the way that Maori culture is very much celebrated in New Zealand today. Most every sign/building is written in English along with Maori.

Community law centres exist regionally around New Zealand, but the centre, Te Ratonga Ture, that was dedicated to providing services for the Maori community by Maori lawyers and volunteers in Wellington had its funding cut. Because of this, there is a real void to fill in the interest of these legal needs. I am working to develop an education reference for our volunteer lawyers regarding Maori legal issues, particularly in land rights. Also, the reference will focus on ways that we can become more culturally sensitive to Maori clients' needs and preferences. This will be an ongoing project for me throughout my time here.

You can see some of the "long white clouds" that New Zealand is so named after in this picture that I took from the harbour in Wellington. Since I work not too far from the waterfront, I take a good number of walks around to take in the views. Even on a windy, rainy day which comes fairly frequently in the New Zealand winter, the sights really are breathtaking.

First full week in Tel Aviv

I just finished my first week at the Hotline for Migrant Workers in Tel Aviv, Israel (hotline.org.il). The Hotline for Migrant Workers does much more than answer phone calls from migrant workers - their main mission is (a) promoting the rights of undocumented migrant workers and refugees and (b) eliminating trafficking in persons in Israel. They also have been working a lot recently on behalf of asylum seekers, mainly from Eritrea and Sudan, to get them refugee status.

So far, I'm having a great time in Israel and at work! Aside from the recent political controversy, my first few days were restful and I have been exploring the city and getting acclimated here. I went to a giant Hebrew book fair, the Tel Aviv Gay Pride Parade (right), and wandered the marketplaces in Tel Aviv and Yafo.

My first night out in Tel Aviv, fliers for prostitutes were left in the windows of my friend's car. I had heard of this but never seen it before - it's illegal in Israel to advertise sexual services in newspapers (partly thanks to the work of the Hotline for Migrant Workers) but it's still allowed when the ad is separate from other materials. (right). Prostitution itself is no longer a crime in Israel, according to my supervisor - the women who are discovered in sex work are given training and help, not treated as criminals. Brothels, however, and the pimps and traffickers that run them, are outlawed. Seeing the fliers made me feel dismayed but also gave me more conviction - there are some major societal problems in Israel and I want to help solve them while I'm here (as much as I can).

One thing I learned that made me proud of our own government is that until the 2000s, trafficking in Israel was rampant and barely mentioned in Israeli law. Then the US State Dept. started classifying countries in three tiers according to the way they dealt with trafficking in their territory, and Israel was in the bottom tier, threatening their U.S. aid. Because of this threat, the Israeli government severely cracked down on human trafficking and raided many of the brothels in South Tel Aviv which were only a few blocks from where our office is located.

A sad thing about working in the office is the constant stream of migrant workers and asylum seekers who call and visit, and often the other employees have to explain to them that their hopes to stay in Israel or get a relative or friend released from a detention center are unlikely at best. Many people call the Hotline from prison, and sometimes after the legal department here spends all this time on their case, an unsympathetic judge will declare that it's really not that dangerous in their home county after all, and order a deportation procedure. Israel, which has been the destination of several thousand refugees in recent years, does not have a workable system in place for granting asylum, and many of these refugees have ended up in in detention centers near Tel Aviv or near the Israel-Egyptian border. Sometimes groups of refugees reach the Israeli border and are sent back through the Sinai desert that they just traveled through - and worse, to face the Egyptian border guards who have a policy of shooting refugees to stop them from reaching the border. (link)

Next week I'm going with one of the two lawyers who work here to court to watch his argument for a client who is seeking asylum status, and then on Thursday several other volunteers and I will be trained to interview migrant workers and asylum seekers in a detention center. The goal is to construct a case for them to stay or be released, and sometimes hopefully we will be able to find representative cases that will be useful for changing the law as a whole.

I am learning SO much here - not just about Israeli law and migrant workers but about the political situation in Eritrea, Ethiopia and Sudan (among other countries) and the systems in place for migrant workers in many other places around the world, which we are going to put together as a potential model for revising the Israeli system. Looking forward to the next two months!

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Arusha, Tanzania

Greetings from Arusha, Tanzania, where I am interning at the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).

For my first blog, I am posting a summary I have written to provide a little background information on the history of Rwanda, the buildup to the genocide, and the creation and work of the ICTR.

Historical Context of the 1994 Violence in Rwanda

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In order to understand the violence of 1994, during which about 800,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu were systematically massacred in less than 100 days, it is essential to understand the historical buildup to this violence and the labyrinth of social, political and economic forces that shaped Rwanda’s journey from colonization to independence, from one form of autocratic rule to another. Especially key is the racialization of Rwandan society under colonial rule, and its extension after independence in the 1st and 2nd Republics, contributing to waves of ethnic tension and violence starting in 1959 and culminating in 1994.

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When Europeans first came upon pre-colonial society in Rwanda, they observed its composure primarily of two different groups, the same two which compose its society today: the majority Hutu, and the Tutsi. Society was organized by a divine kingship traditionally dominated by Tutsi, yet several Hutu principalities remained. Traditionally, there was a great degree of fluidity between the two groups, who share the same land, culture and language. The groups have historically been in most regards similar, although not necessarily equal, and one could move between these categories through marriage or acquisition of wealth.

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German colonization in Rwanda officially began in 1899. The 1919 League of Nations mandate made the transfer of power to Belgian colonial rule effective. As had the Germans, the Belgians preferred the Tutsi, who were regarded to have more European features than the Hutu. With their support, the Tutsi were able to enhance their control over the population, and rework the social and economic systems in their favor. The consolidation of such a system of ethnic division was allowed for through the colonizers’ “ideological construction of Rwanda’s past, and … present” based on a racist ideology that legitimized the Tutsi superiority over the Hutu as natural, scientific and traditional.[1] This ideology lies at the core of the racialization of Rwanda and of the violence that has plagued the country in intervals since 1959.

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Social and economic changes came in the wake of World War II, and the Tutsi elite began to push for liberalizing reforms, contesting the colonial order in a growing bid for independence. This led to a shift in favor during the last years of colonial rule, and the Church, which had been dominated by Tutsi, as well as the Belgians began to foster a “Hutu counter-elite” which gradually came into formation protesting their position of subordination. The creation of political parties in the late 1950s contributed to such racial tensions, culminating in the looting and violence of November 1959. This incident proved Belgium’s alliance had shifted to the Hutu, and prompted a move towards self-rule in Rwanda.
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Communal elections were set in the summer of 1960 and the Hutu won a landslide victory; “under the banner of ‘democratic majority rule’ on one side and ‘immediate independence’ on the other, it was a fight between two competing elites, the newly developed Hutu counter-elite produced by the church and the older neo-traditionalist Tutsi elite which the colonial authorities had promoted since the 1920s.”[2] As Tutsi chiefs were replaced with Hutu, around 130,000 Tutsi fled the country to cross into neighboring states in the early 1960s. The so called “revolution,” closely administered by the Belgians, could really be seen more as a power trade-off from the Tutsi to the Hutu, who picked up the reigns of oppression over the Tutsi much as had been done to them before. The monarchy was soon abolished. After Gregoire Kayibanda’s “legal coup” in January 28, 1961, the Belgians granted formal independence to the Republic of Rwanda in July of that year, solidifying the 1959 revolution and the formation of the 1st Republic. An ethnic quota policy was kept in all institutions, including schools, universities, the civil service, and private business, to ensure that the Tutsi, who represented only 9%, of the population, would not represent more than that percentage in any institution.

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Attacks on Rwanda from exiled Tutsi groups continued, culminating in the invasion of Bugesera from Burundi in December 1963, which was quickly crushed but contributed to a massive wave of repression and slaughter of Tutsi. By January 1964, 10,000 were killed and the remaining Tutsi politicians in the country were put to death. A decade later, unrest among the elite, and the killings of Hutu by the Tutsi government in Burundi scared the government, which responded by cracking down in late 1972 and early 1973 on enforcement of the ethnic quota policy in all institutions by establishing vigilante committees which often stood to gain from pushing Tutsi out of jobs.

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New waves of ethnic tension, Tutsi emigration, peasant unrest, and elite frustration over the country’s immobility and isolation, cleared the way for Major-General Juvenal Habyarimana on July 5, 1973 to take power in a bloodless coup marking the start of the 2nd Republic, which would be marked by single-party oppressive authoritarian rule and the continued equation of democracy with demographically justified power. Eventually, shrinking resources due to the fall of coffee prices and the collapse of tin mining in the late 1980s led to increased competition among the elite for political power to enable access to foreign aid funding, and political clan rivalries ensued. Meanwhile, unrest among the heavily taxed and worked peasants was generated by the deep 1989 budget cut that took away from social services. With the rising population and shrinking food supply, the peasant class grew more and more dissatisfied with the situation of land distribution in the country, which was one of the most population dense in the world.

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By the time of Habyarimana’s announcement of support for a multi-party system in 1990, prompting the mobilization of various groups, the Rwandan scene of politics had plunged into calamity. The Tutsi Rwandese refugees in Uganda who had formed the Rwandese Alliance for National Unity, later to be replaced by the Rwandese Patriotic Front (RPF) in exile, a politically militant group aimed at securing their return, took advantage of the apparently fragile political context and revved up their plans to invade. By October 1990 they made their strike, marking the start of the civil war between the RPF and the Rwandan Government Forcers (FAR).
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Peace negotiations arranged by regional and international forces resulted in the Arusha Accords signed in August 1993. The agreement set out to establish the rule of law through a power-sharing pact that would allow for repatriation of refugees and integration of the armed forces. These conditions, however, were regarded as threatening to the ruling regime, which feared its power was slipping away. The accords were not implemented and the situation did not improve in Rwanda, in part due to elements on both sides of the conflict desirous to bypass power-sharing.

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When President Habyarimana’s plane was shot down on its return to Kigali from discussions about the accords in Burundi on April 6, 1994, forces behind the genocide were unleashed. The assassination of the President was immediately followed by the murder of several moderate targets within the ruling bloc and of the political opposition, and the massacre of Tutsi and moderate Hutu civilians by elements of armed forces and interahamwe militias. The mass killing, rape, and violence were the product of a planned attempt by Hutus in the political and military establishment to eliminate their “opponents” entirely. Within two days, the entire government had been replaced with Hutu extremists. The RPF re-launched its military campaign under the direction of Major General Paul Kagame to end the killing of Tutsi and to take over the capital. The RPF ultimately succeeded in taking over Kigali roughly two months later, on July 4, 1994, thereafter establishing the Government of National Unity on July 19, 1994.
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In only three months, between 500,000 to one million victims were claimed, mostly Tutsi- possibly as many as three quarters of the entire Tutsi population- but also some moderate Hutu. In order to combat the Hutu forces that continued their attacks into Rwanda over the next years led by the some of the hundreds of thousands of Hutu, militias, and FAR soldiers which fled to Zaire (now the DRC) after the RPF capture of Kigali, the RPF intervened in Zaire on two separate occasions. These interventions have contributed to fighting throughout the region of the Great Lakes. This fighting occurred as attempts were made at re-education and reintegration of combatants, establishment of truth and justice through local, national, and international avenues, and reconstruction of a war torn country, economy, politics, and society.
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International Reaction to the Rwandan Genocide and Legal Classification of the Crimes Committed
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The slaughter of roughly 800,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu by militias, parts of the army, and the local population between April 6 and mid-July, 1994 was met with a lethargic reaction by the international community, which wrangled over the application of the term “genocide” while hundreds were brutalized, raped, and murdered each day. The UN Secretary General publicly made the distinction between civil war and the “massacre of civilians” on April 29, 1994, and not until June 8 did the UN Security Council issue a resolution acknowledging “acts of genocide,” although not necessarily “genocide,” in Rwanda. By June 28, 1994, the UN Commission on Human Rights’ Special Rapporteur on Rwanda presented his report on the situation, and, drawing on Article II of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (UNGC), he claimed that such conditions were met so as to constitute genocide. The application of the UNGC to the situation in Rwanda was done with much delay, and it proved to be a complex and controversial process.
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While the violence in Rwanda was in part the product of a civil war, and of two competing groups of elites’ refusal to give away or share power in any type of agreement, the political application of the term genocide, as opposed to civil war, insurgency, or revolution, has been consistently made by the New National Unity Government led by the RPF, with this recognition resounding around the world led by the West.
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The intentional, planned, and widespread killing of civilians in Rwanda during a period of armed conflict may be classified as war crimes, as defined under Article 8 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court 37 I.L.M. 999 (1998), and Article 3 common to the Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949 for the Protection of War Victims and Additional Protocol II thereto of June 8, 1977. The systematic and widespread rape, torture, murder, and persecution of the Tutsi in particular as a group, on political and ethnic grounds, as part of a systematic and planned attack on civilian populations also demands the classification of crimes against humanity. While the violence perpetuated by the RAF was of course far greater in scale and intent, the violence perpetuated by the RPF may also classify as crimes against humanity.

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The importance of the label genocide is that it goes beyond the targeting of a particular group which constitutes a crime against humanity, to cover such targeting with the intent to exterminate such group. The UNGC was adopted by Resolution 260 (III) A of the UN General Assembly on December 9, 1948, making genocide a crime under international law. According to Article II of the Convention,
"genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."
The convention declares that anyone who commits, conspires to or attempts to commit, incites others to commit, or is complicit in genocide shall be punished, “whether they are constitutionally responsible rulers, public officials or private individuals,” in either a State tribunal in the place the acts where committed or in an international penal tribunal. Both Rwanda’s national legislation regarding genocide and the ICTR use the UNGC’s definition. Case law from the ICTR has since established that rape may be an act of genocide when it is committed with intent to destroy one of the protected groups stated in Article II.
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The ICTR, in its decision of its first trial involving the prosecution of Jean Paul Akayesu, former mayor of Taba commune and the first person ever to be convicted of, among other crimes, rape as genocide, took the opinion that the violence in Rwanda indeed went beyond that of a civil war, to constitute not only war crimes and crimes against humanity, but also genocide on behalf of the RAF forces and its militias. The ICTR decision stated that “there is no doubt that considering their undeniable scale, their systematic nature and their atrociousness, the massacres were aimed at exterminating the group that was targeted.” In other words, the 1994 massacres did not “occur solely within the context of the conflict between the RAF and the RPF” but rather that “the genocide did indeed take place against the Tutsi group, alongside the conflict.”[3]
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Prosecution of the Rwandan Genocide through Criminal Law

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The prosecution of the Rwandan genocide has allowed for international courses of justice to be run, while incorporating efforts to achieve justice on a national level, in both traditional and inventive ways.
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On the international level, the UN Security Council established the ICTR by Resolution 955 of November 8, 1994, acting under UN Charter Chapter VII. The ICTR was established for the prosecution of persons responsible for genocide and other serious violations of international humanitarian law committed in the territory of Rwanda, or by Rwandans in the region, between January 1, 1994 and December 31, 1994. It is important to note that serious violations of humanitarian law and crimes against humanity committed both by the RAF and by the RPF, as well as the crime of genocide committed by RAF’s forces, are justiciable under the ICTR.

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The stated aim of the ICTR is to aid national reconciliation and ensure the rule of law, making sure such violations are stopped and redressed, thereby contributing to peace in the region. The ICTR is the second ad hoc tribunal in the world, and has since been responsible for the first genocide-related convictions ever made in an international court. Furthermore, the ICTR has played a key role in the development of international criminal justice, and has contributed to the groundwork for the development of the International Criminal Court.

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In addition to the cases prosecuted by the ICTR, genocide-related cases are also prosecuted at a national level in Rwanda through both the traditional court system as well as through a new gacaca system. The gacaca system is based on the Rwandan tradition of community conflict resolution. It was developed to address the genocide on a massive scale beyond the country’s traditional justice system, which has been hindered by its very limited resources and overwhelmed by the massive population of suspected killers and prisoners, which at one point constituted over half of the country’s adult male population. The most serious offenders, as determined by Rwandan law, are either tried in the ICTR or the traditional national court system. The lower-level offenders are tried through the gacaca system, which aims to abolish the culture of impunity and speed up the process reconciliation through participative justice incorporating local populations in the judgment of participants of the 1994 violence.
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Importance of the ICTR and Establishment of International Criminal Justice and Legal Accountability in the Wake of the Rwandan Genocide
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The naming of the crime of genocide in the aftermath of the 1994 violence in Rwanda and the subsequent prosecution of individuals in criminal trials has re-created the past in a sense, and has given the international community a chance to establish and enforce the boundaries of international law. While there is both the risk that criminal trials may lessen combatants’ or leaders’ willingness to concede power out of fear that amnesties are unreliable, or that in some cases efforts to achieve justice may exacerbate tensions within a fragile political situation, thereby worsening the condition of human rights, the hope is that criminal trials will help to establish norms and expectations of punishment, making an example for current and future leaders in the country and beyond. While arguments calling for peace over justice may be forceful, one must only recall Hitler’s question “Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?” to observe the potential consequences of failure to pursue justice in the face of gross violations; for the Rwandan Hutu government, the international silence that met the 1972 slaughter of Hutu in Burundi may have taught them a similarly tragic lesson of impunity.[4]
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The role of the ICTR is especially important given that it represents the first time that high-ranking individuals have been held accountable in an international court for mass human rights violations in Africa, and the first time that that a head of government has been convicted of genocide anywhere in the world. The standard-setting and abolishment of a culture of impunity that the ICTR has contributed to has helped enable national reconstruction, as well as the restoration of the rule of law to a war-ravaged zone, and thus helps to enable national reconstruction.
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The ICTR: Past, Present, and Future
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The ICTR is headquartered in Arusha, Tanzania. It is composed of three organs: The Chambers, including three Trial Chambers and the Appeals Chamber, which hear trials, the Office of the Prosecutor, responsible for investigations and prosecutions, and the Registry, responsible for judicial and administrative support. Cases before the ICTR are heard at first instance by a Trial Chamber of three international temporary or permanent judges, and, if appealed, by the Appeals Chamber of five international permanent judges.
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To date, 50 cases have been completed at the ICTR, including eight acquittals and eight cases pending appeal. Completed trials include those of the former Prime Minister, and several political and military leaders. These cases have played an important role in extending the concept of respondent superior to civil authorities, which has made it possible for the first woman prosecuted at the ICTR to be currently charged with rape via her responsibility for the acts of her subordinates. While the ICTR’s mandate covers violations of international humanitarian law committed by the RPF as well as by the Hutu forces, and the Prosecutor’s official stance is that it continues to investigate such cases against the RPF, it is important to note that not one Tutsi or member of the RPF has been tried at the ICTR.
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The ICTR’s mandate has been extended several times by the UN Security Council, most recently until 2012. Currently, twenty four cases are in progress, several trials are ongoing, and two are pending after the recent arrest of two suspects in late 2009. The tentative date set to complete all first instance trials is by the end of 2011, with another two and a half years estimated for appeals. Although the vast majority of the originally indicted 90 high-priority suspects have been apprehended, eleven key fugitive suspects remain at large. The Prosecution has stepped up efforts to ensure the location and apprehension of these fugitives, and the ICTR President Dennis Byron has recently expressed that the goal of the tribunal will not be completed until each of the accused is arrested. Although not all of the indicted will be tried at the ICTR, four of them have been earmarked for trial at the ICTR based on their leadership status and extent of participation in the genocide, in accordance with the priorities laid out in Security Council resolution 1534 (2004). Others will most likely be transferred to national jurisdictions for trial.
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While it has been nearly sixteen years since the Rwandan genocide, the year 2010 is a crucial time in implementation of the ICTR’s Completion Strategy in preparation for the end of its mandate, and particularly in attaining the goal of completing all first instance trials by the end of 2010.

Sources:
Alston, Philip, Henry J. Steiner, and Ryan Goodman. International Human Rights in Context. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.

Eltringham, Nigel. “Debating the Rwandan Genocide.” Violence, Political Culture & Development in Africa. Ed. Preben Kaarsholm. Oxford: James Curry Ltd., 2006.

Internet Site of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. 8 June 2010.

Mamdani, Mahmood. The Politics of Naming: Genocide, Civil War, Insurgency. London: London Review of Books, 2007.

Powell, Jeffrey H. “Amnesty, Reintegrating and Reconciliation in Rwanda.” Military Review 88.5 (October 2008): 84-90.

Prunier, Gerard. The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide. New York: Colombia University Press, 1995.

[1] Prunier, Gerard. The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide. New York: Colombia University Press, 1995. 36.
[2] Prunier, 50.
[3] Alston, Philip, Henry J. Steiner, and Ryan Goodman. International Human Rights in Context. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. 1278.
[4] Eltringham, Nigel. “Debating the Rwandan Genocide.” Violence, Political Culture & Development in Africa. Ed. Preben Kaarsholm. Oxford: James Curry Ltd., 2006. 74.