War Crimes Prosecution Watch

East Timor Reception, Truth and Reconciliation Commission (CAVR)

Official Website of the East Timor Reception, Truth and Reconciliation Commission (CAVR)

Suharto Avoids International Tribunal
Yahoo! News - Associated Press
by Slobodon Lekic
March 28, 2006

The spotlight of international justice has shone on Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic to hold them accountable for alleged war crimes. But many are asking: what about Suharto?

Indonesia 's dictator for 32 years is widely believed responsible for the deaths of twice as many people as the former Iraqi and Serbian leaders combined, yet he lives freely in a posh residential district of Jakarta.

"Suharto certainly belongs in the same category as Milosevic or Saddam as far as crimes against humanity are concerned," said Dede Oetomo, a human rights activist and professor at Airlangga University in Surabaya. "He receives preferential treatment in the West because he delivered Indonesia to them during the Cold War, while nobody in the political class here sees any benefit in pursuing him."

Critics say Suharto's and other cases highlight an inconsistency that lends credibility to charges that the trials in The Hague and Baghdad are "victors' justice."

In Iraq, Saddam's tumultuous trial is continuing in fits and spurts, while the effort to bring Milosevic to justice came to an abrupt halt this month when he died in custody at the International War Crimes Tribunal.

But Suharto, 85, is among half a dozen former despots around the world who have managed to evade or delay justice for their alleged misdeeds.

They include Ethiopia's Mengistu Haile Mariam, who directed the "Red Terror" of the 1970s but now lives comfortably in exile in Zimbabwe, and Chile's former dictator, Gen. Augusto Pinochet, whose security forces murdered thousands of leftists and other political opponents from 1973 to 1990. He is free on bail after being charged in a tax-evasion case.

Liberia 's new government is urging Nigeria to extradite exiled warlord Charles Taylor, accused of causing tens of thousands of deaths during its civil war. And in Cambodia, no Khmer Rouge figure has stood trial for the death of an estimated 1.7 million people between 1975-79.

It weakens the deterrent force of war crimes tribunals, said Dr. Harold Crouch, an expert on Indonesia at the Australian National University.

"Obviously the deterrent value would be much greater if they indicted all these people," Crouch said. "But Suharto always did what the West wanted him to do; that's the main difference between him and Saddam and Milosevic."

Suharto was an unknown two-star general in 1965 when he put down a still-unexplained military mutiny which he attributed to leftist officers. In the confusion that followed, Suharto seized power from the legal government and launched a purge in which at least a half million people — mostly communists, socialists, trade unionists and other leftists — were executed.

As he tightened his grip, Suharto quickly gained support from Washington and other Western capitals, which viewed him as a bulwark against communism in Southeast Asia.

Washington facilitated Indonesia's 1969 takeover of the former Dutch colony of West Papua, and acquiesced in its 1975 invasion of the former Portuguese colony of East Timor. The long wars that followed have claimed 200,000 lives in West Papua, human rights monitors say, and 183,000 in East Timor according to a U.N. and East Timorese government report.

The number of innocent Iraqis who perished during Saddam's rule is usually put at over 300,000, with no precise statistics available. Milosevic's wars in former Yugoslavia are said to have claimed at least 200,000 lives, although some place the figure lower.

In Indonesia, several dozen officers have been tried on charges of killing of hundreds of civilians in East Timor and elsewhere during Suharto's time, but all were freed.

"If you can't convict a captain, how can you convict his president?" said Crouch.

The leaders of Indonesia's fledgling democracy set out to try Suharto for corruption, gave up, and have never sought to bring him to justice for war crimes.

"The problem for any post-Suharto government is that it is difficult to bring him to trial ... because he is still backed and supported by the military, which itself participated in the killings of tens of thousands of people," said Munarman, head of the Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation. Like Suharto, he goes by one name.

"The politicians have to be very careful. There is still a very real possibility the military could wrest back power," he said.

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Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia for the Prosecution of Crimes Committed during the Period of Democratic Kampuchea

Awaiting justice in Cambodia
Seattle Times
by Ellen Nakashima - The Washington Post
March 8,2006

Taing Kim Sam was raped by three Khmer Rouge soldiers when she was 18. Now 49, she has been waiting more than half her life for justice. She has deep reservations about whether her government can deliver, but it is finally about to try.

On a recent Sunday, she strode into a spacious, air-conditioned courtroom built in an arid military field on the capital's outskirts. Vinyl covers still protected the new upholstered seats, and the smell of fresh paint and sawdust wafted in the cool air.

Taing Kim, petite with large, expressive eyes, peered in awe at the crescent-shaped courtroom, at the polished wooden stage with a table and chairs, at the seats for 500 spectators.

"It's so huge," she murmured. "It looks suitable for a tribunal."

More than a quarter-century ago, the Khmer Rouge tortured, executed and starved to death about 1.7 million Cambodians in a fratricidal fury that few today can comprehend.

The communist movement sought to create its vision of a peasant society supposedly free of class structures and foreign influence. It killed teachers, doctors, merchants and Muslims. It abolished religion and closed schools and banks. It emptied cities and forced people to work on cooperative farms.

Now, 27 years after the brutal regime was driven from power, the Cambodian government, assisted by the United Nations, is taking its first tangible step toward justice. The courtroom and an administrative office opened Feb. 6, and prosecutors will be arriving soon to begin formal investigations for the court.

The first defendants likely will stand trial in 2007, said Sean Visoth, administrative director for the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, the official name of the tribunal.

Activists and some survivors of the Khmer Rouge program of killings are concerned that the tribunal, dominated by Cambodian judges and prosecutors, will fall short of international standards. They say that the $56.3 million, three-year budget is far too small, and that the process is taking so long that senior Khmer Rouge leaders could die before trials begin. There will be no death penalty.

Taing Kim is one of those torn between a desire for accountability and skepticism about the Cambodian officials running the tribunal. "I still worry that the government judges will take sides with the Khmer Rouge," she said, "and that justice will be a fraud."

Visoth asked skeptics to reserve judgment. "It's in the best interests of Cambodia to make this process successful," he said.

Leaving it to the law

Taing Kim was among 388 survivors, former prison guards and interrogators who arrived in the capital this month from provinces across the country to see the courtroom and tour the most infamous sites of torture and death. They entered the cells of Tuol Sleng, the school-turned-prison where an estimated 14,000 to 16,000 people were held and tortured. They beheld Choeung Ek, the most notorious of a series of killing fields, where about 14,000 people were sent from Tuol Sleng to be executed.

The visit was organized by the Documentation Center of Cambodia, a nonprofit research institute that has spent nine years cataloguing Khmer Rouge atrocities.

Under a searing sun, Taing Kim alighted from a bus, took several steps into Choeung Ek and stopped before a shallow rectangular pit, empty now but for parched grass.

"That," she said, jabbing a finger toward the former mass grave, "looks just like the grave that they intended to bury me in."

"They" were Khmer Rouge soldiers, some of them teenagers and boys no older than she was at the time, she recalled.

Taing Kim was a newlywed when the Khmer Rouge took power in April 1975. She and her husband were sent to a labor camp. One night, he was taken away. Three nights later, the village chief, a Khmer Rouge member, came for her, she recalled.

"Your husband has found a good place to live and wants you to join him," he said.

She was taken to a clearing, where she saw several other women. Suddenly, three soldiers grabbed her and tore off her clothes, she recounted. The "animal act" began, she said bitterly. The first soldier raped her, then pushed her to another, who took his turn, then pushed her to the third, who raped her again.

What she saw next is seared in her memory. The soldiers began killing the other women they had raped, one by one, with blows to the back of the head, and throwing them into a grave.

Taing Kim escaped from the young soldier guarding her by telling him she had to relieve herself in the bushes. She ran until she found a pond thick with rushes. She waded in and hid there for three nights.

As she recounted her story, she raised her left hand, shaking two fingers for emphasis. "Words cannot convey my anger," Taing Kim said. "I wanted to kill the Khmer Rouge after the regime fell. But I decided to leave it to the law."

Obeying out of fear

On the day Taing Kim visited Tuol Sleng, Lach Mien, 48, a slight, deeply tanned farmer with a broad nose and full lips, returned to the prison for the first time in 27 years.

"We were under their command," he said of the Khmer Rouge. "If I refused to obey, I would be killed."

By his account, he was 17 when a Khmer Rouge district commander selected him to join the army. He was dispatched straight to the battlefield.

In 1978, Lach Mien was promoted and sent to work at Tuol Sleng. He first worked typing up interrogation reports. Then he became an interrogator.

"It's not a job to be proud of," he recounted. "But I did it because I was afraid."

On the tour last month, he walked through prison cells for the first time since a Vietnamese invasion force overthrew the Khmer Rouge in 1979. He viewed shackles and iron spikes lying on a mattress. In another room, he saw a braided rope whip in a glass case.

"I had this in my room," he said. "If the prisoner refused to answer the question, I used it."

His job, he said, was to force people to confess to being agents of the CIA, the KGB or Vietnam. If they refused, he would call in the torturer.

Suddenly, a look of shock and recognition lit up Lach Mien's face. "That's me!" he said, pointing to a faded, peeling black-and-white photo on a display board.

"I feel like I was born in the wrong place," he said, with a tone of remorse mixed with horror at what he had done.

As he walked through the courtyard, near the gallows where prisoners had been lifted upside down and dipped in jars of filthy water, he met Chum Mey, one of only five known living survivors of Tuol Sleng.

"Who are you?" asked Chum Mey, now 75. "I was a prisoner. That was my room: 04," he said, pointing to a room on the second floor.

"I was an interrogator," Lach Mien replied softly.

Chum Mey was taken aback. "Did you know Mr. Seng? He was my interrogator."

"He was my team leader," Lach Mien said, avoiding Chum Mey's eyes.

"Did you know Mr. Hor?" Chum Mey continued, his brow knit in agitation.

"He was the chief of the torture unit," Lach Mien replied. "He tortured those who refused to confess."

Hor had broken Chum Mey's fingers and torn out his toenails.

Lach Mien told Chum Mey that he felt compelled to do as he was ordered or be killed himself. There was a moment of tension, but Chum Mey, eager to see the rest of the prison, moved on.

Later, Chum Mey said he felt a flash of anger when he learned of Lach Mien's identity. But he wants to let the law handle the guilty, he said. "He did not commit this crime by his own decision."

Political will lacking?

Youk Chhang, 45, is director of the Documentation Center of Cambodia. He was beaten and jailed briefly by the Khmer Rouge when he was 14. In his view, the tribunal's success will depend on public participation, so that the people can decide for themselves whether justice is being served.

"There are still a lot of questions about why it happened, how it happened, and who did this," he said. "We still deny that Cambodians are capable of killing other Cambodians. It brings shame to our nation. We need the trial to reflect on ourselves. ... Knowledge heals."

Activists are skeptical that the Cambodian courts can fairly conduct a genocide trial, even with international help. The courts here are partisan and controlled by the ruling coalition, said Kek Galabru, president of the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights.

She noted that the process so far has taken nine years and that the Cambodian government still has not raised its $13.3 million share of the tribunal budget.

Prime Minister Hun Sen was a member of the Khmer Rouge before breaking with the group and defecting to Vietnam in 1977.

The tribunal's U.N. deputy administrative director, Michelle Lee, said the United Nations could withdraw from the process if officials think it fails to meet international standards. Cambodian judges will constitute a majority on each panel, but as a safeguard, an international judge must agree before a guilty verdict is reached.

"Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't see much political will by the government to see such a tribunal," Kek Galabru said. "They have to show us."

On a Saturday last month, at the Choeung Ek killing field, Taing Kim lit a stick of incense and placed it in an urn in front of a granite stupa, a Buddhist memorial to the victims. Inside, more than 5,000 human skulls lay on a series of tiers. One was labeled "Juvenile female, 15-20 years." Another "Senile male, over 60 years old."

They too, she said, await justice.

Cambodia wants UN rights envoy replaced
Jurist
by Tom Henry
March 29, 2006

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen [official profile] said Wednesday that UN human rights envoy Yash Ghai should be removed from his position as special envoy after Ghai publicly criticized Cambodia's intolerance to dissent [AP report]. The comments come one day after Ghai said that Hun Sen's rule has meant little in the way of human rights or political reform in Cambodia [JURIST news archive]

Ghai was appointed by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan [UN News report] in November 2005 to review the status of human rights violations [JURIST report] in Cambodia. Since that time, Ghai has visited the nation and met with several opposition leaders imprisoned by the government and has stated their detentions are unlawful under the nation's constitution [text]. AP has more.

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Darfur (ICC)

Official Website of the International Criminal Court

New violence on Chadian-Sudanese border threatens humanitarian crisis - UN
UN News Centre
March 24, 2006

A violent cocktail of regular and rebel forces on both sides of the Chadian-Sudanese frontier combined with an increasing number of incursions by armed groups has forced thousands of people from their homes and could seriously impede humanitarian aid, the United Nations World Food Programme ( WFP) warned today.

“We are at an extremely delicate stage in Chad - right on the edge,” WFP Chad Country Director Stefano Porretti said of the area, where the agency is already feeding more than 207,400 Sudanese refugees who have fled three years of vicious fighting between government, pro-government militias and rebel forces in the Darfur region.

“Guarantees of both financial commitment to our operations and security in the region are essential to help stave off an even more serious humanitarian crisis, which we could have on our hands within weeks,” he added in an appeal to international donors.

Most refugees have been in Chad since 2004, but a fresh influx from Sudan has arrived over the past few months. An initial WFP assessment of the most affected areas in the eastern Chad border zone indicated that most people still had substantial food stocks that they can access, largely because the last harvest was one of the best in recent years.

But with the annual ‘hunger season’ approaching, WFP said there were very real fears that people would soon require essential humanitarian assistance. The most immediate need reported was for the safety of civilians in the prevailing insecurity.

“It is clear that the security situation along the border has deteriorated in recent weeks,” Mr. Porretti said. “WFP is coordinating with partners, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, to ensure the situation is closely monitored. But the longer the insecurity in the area persists, the more serious the situation will become.”

While it is difficult to assess the magnitude of needs because of current insecurity, WFP estimates that several thousand people will require assistance. “Financially, our operation in eastern Chad is already clinging on by its fingertips - significant new requirements will require significant new resources from our donors,” Mr. Porretti said.

The annual mid-year ‘hunger season’ will overlap closely with the annual rains, rendering most of the roads in eastern Chad completely impassable. WFP is making major efforts to pre-position as much food as possible ahead of the rains, an effort that depends heavily on speedy confirmation of donor contributions to ensure that food arrives early enough to be transported onwards to the camps.

WFP also warned today that its food stocks in Chad were being further stretched by a new wave of refugees fleeing violence in the Central African Republic (CAR) – some 46,000 already and still growing. A serious break in supplies is expected by June.

The agency’s humanitarian air service, which provides a critical lifeline for UN and non-governmental organization (NGO) staff and supplies to arrive in eastern Chad, only reachable by air during the rainy season, is also facing suspension very shortly if further funds are not forthcoming.

Arab leaders to help fund AU force in Darfur
Agence France Press -- Turkish Press.com
March 29, 2006

Arab leaders have agreed a 150-million-dollar aid package for cash-strapped African Union troops deployed in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region.

The move came after summit host Sudan sought to win backing for its opposition to plans for the dispatch of UN peacekeepers to Darfur, where war, disease and famine have cost up to 300,000 lives in three years.

Arab leaders stopped short of an outright rejection of wider international intervention in the conflict, but said any deployment of any other troops should have the approval of the government in Khartoum.

The leaders endorsed a resolution to allocate 150 million dollars to the African troops over the next six months and called on Arab countries to "provide financial and logistic support to the AU mission in Darfur to enable it to continue performing its tasks."

The resolution stressed that the AU should "continue its efforts and accomplish its mission to end the crisis of Darfur," mainly through peace talks being held in Abuja, according to a copy seen by AFP.

Arab leaders also stipulated that the deployment of any other troops in the region required Sudan's "pre-approval" and called on "Arab African countries to strengthen their participation in the AU force."

But regional heavyweight President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt said in an interview published Wednesday he would not send troops to Darfur unless there was a peace agreement between rebels and Khartoum.

"Only then could Egypt take part in a peacekeeping force in this region," he told the Al-Mussawar weekly.

War broke out in Darfur in February 2003 when rebel groups revolted against what they say is the political and economic marginalization of the region's black African ethnic groups by the Arab-dominated regime in Khartoum.

The government responded by unleashing the Janjaweed militia, a force of horse-mounted gunmen, which has been blamed for many atrocities including systemic rape and the burning of villages.

The conflict in Darfur and a subsequent humanitarian crisis has also left an estimated 2.4 million displaced but Sudan has long been opposed to a wider international role in the region.

The Arab summit move followed a vote in the UN Security Council on Friday to speed up plans to deploy peacekeepers to replace the AU mission.

But Sudanese Foreign Minister Lam Akol had demanded Arab funding for the AU mission to block "attempts to hand over its tasks to international forces."

The 7,000-strong African Union force was first deployed in 2004 and is currently being largely financed by the United States, Canada and the European Union.

The International Criminal Court has told the Security Council it has enough evidence of killing, rape and destruction in the war-ravaged region to warrant bringing suspects to trial.

But the Sudanese government established its own special court in June to try Darfur criminals and has vehemently maintained its right to handle the case domestically.

Bush calls for NATO troops in Darfur
United Press International
March 29, 2006

President Bush Wednesday called for a NATO security force to be deployed in Sudan.

Bush said he would like to see NATO peacekeeping troops join the existing 7,500-strong African Union force to provide logistical and command support and to serve as a symbol of the West's commitment to ending the ethnic cleansing that has raged in the Darfur region.

"This is serious business... We're just not playing... a diplomatic holding game," he said. "But that when we say genocide, we mean that the genocide needs to be stopped."

Bush met with Nigerian President Olesegun Obasanjo on Wednesday to discuss regional security and the Darfur crisis. He said his discussions with Obasanjo reached an understanding that peacekeeping troops are only the first step in bringing a settlement to the region.

"We talked about the need for a parallel track, a peace process to go forward, that there needs to be unity amongst the rebel groups," Bush said. "(Obasanjo) told me he has met with the rebel groups, trying to come up with a focused message that can then be used to negotiate with the government of Sudan."

NATO rules out Darfur force
United Press International -- World Peace Herald
by Gareth Harding
March 30, 2006

NATO has categorically ruled out sending troops to Darfur despite pleas from U.S. President George W. Bush and several high-ranking senators for a more robust alliance role to prevent further bloodletting in the war-torn Sudanese province.

Last month, Bush phoned NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer to press the case for the 26-member military bloc to "take the lead" in stopping the slaughter in Darfur. At a White House meeting last week, the U.S. president repeated his demand for the alliance to adopt a more muscular stance on Sudan. Bush said that if the African Union, which currently heads the peacekeeping effort in Darfur, hands over its mission to the United Nations later this year, "NATO can move in with United States' help ... to make it clear to the Sudanese Government that we're intent upon providing security for the people there."

Prominent U.S senators have also called on the Brussels-based military club to become more involved in Darfur. Democrat Joseph Biden of Delaware and Kansas Republican Sam Brownback last month tabled a resolution calling for NATO troops to be sent to the region and for the alliance to enforce a no-flight zone over Darfur.

However, there seems to be little appetite for a greatly enhanced NATO role within the alliance. "No one is discussing, planning or considering a NATO force on the ground in Darfur. That is not one of the options," spokesman James Appathurai told reporters Wednesday after a meeting of NATO ambassadors.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a NATO official told United Press International that the idea of the alliance dispatching ground troops to the troubled province was a "non-starter with the Africans, a non-starter with the United Nations and a non-starter with NATO." Officials in Brussels also criticized the U.S. president for sending out confused messages about what he expects from the alliance. "Bush has been a little bit unclear in his language," said one, referring to the president's call for 20,000 peacekeepers to be sent to Darfur under NATO's command.

There are currently 7,000 poorly-equipped African Union troops in Darfur, an arid and impoverished region of Sudan that has been racked by conflict for almost three years. About 200,000 black Africans -- mainly Christians or animists -- are believed to have been killed by pro-government, Nilotic Muslim militias during the bloody war. A further two million have fled their homes and are now living in makeshift camps. The United States has described the slaughter in west Sudan as "genocide," although the United Nations and European Union have both stopped short of using the term.

NATO last year agreed to airlift African Union troops to Darfur, which is roughly the size of France, and help train its soldiers. "I'm quite sure, as I told the president, that when the U.N. comes, the NATO allies will be ready to do more in enabling a United Nations force in Darfur," De Hoop Scheffer told reporters after his meeting with Bush.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan Monday phoned De Hoop Scheffer to ask the NATO chief to develop a range of possible options for supporting the African Union mission and its possible takeover by the United Nations. But officials said there was unlikely to be a step-change in the alliance's military commitment. "There will be a beefed up NATO role, but there will be no NATO lead in Darfur. People here are talking about more of the same, maybe with more planners and logistical help," said one. Appathurai said the 57-year old bloc would look at Annan's request "in the context of what NATO is already providing."

NATO's reluctance to get dragged further into the Darfur conflict, which is already spilling over the borders into Chad, is partly explained by the fact that its member nations' troops are already bogged down in Iraq, the Balkans and Afghanistan. But there is also strong opposition to international peacekeepers arriving in Darfur within Sudan. Earlier this month, thousands of protestors marched through the capital Khartoum to voice their resistance to United Nations soldiers taking over peacekeeping duties in Darfur. "U.N. troops bring your coffins with you," said one banner at the demonstration. One NATO diplomat told the International Herald Tribune that neither the Sudanese government nor the African Union "want to see white, European troops coming into Sudan," adding that the idea of a no-flight zone over Darfur would be impossible to implement. "Which NATO country would be willing to shoot down a Sudanese plane?"

With the African Union running out of money to pay for its $24 million a month Darfur mission, EU ambassadors Tuesday agreed $60 million in emergency aid to keep the peacekeeping force afloat. The European Commission has already given $195 million to the pan-African body to bankroll its military operation in Sudan.

Kennedy Raises Concerns About Darfur
Associated Press
March 30, 2006

'Khartoum will try corruption, coercion, force, anything' to derail peace talks on the killing in Darfur, a Sudanese activist warns

There is a glimmer of hope for Darfur, where in the past two years 300,000 people have been killed and 2 million displaced in a genocidal war that has been encouraged and funded by Sudan's government. Last week the African Union declared a six-month extension for its 7,000 troops who are patrolling the region and protecting the camps for the displaced. In September, those soldiers may be placed under U.N. authority, which would mean a larger, better-equipped force.

So why is Mudawi Ibrahim Adam not cheering? It's not out of any sympathy for the Sudanese government, which has jailed him three times in the past 18 months, placed him in solitary confinement, confiscated his passport at one point and continues to maintain absurd criminal charges against him--including one that is punishable by death under Sudanese law. (It's a Kafka-esque case: during one of his prison stays he carried out a hunger strike, and as a result has been charged with attempted suicide.) His persecutors want to scare him into silence. But they have failed. Mudawi continues to be an outspoken advocate of democracy and human rights in Sudan. He heads the Sudan Social Development Organization, a human-rights group that monitors the violence in Darfur and, in particular, has documented Khartoum's role in funding, encouraging and assisting the genocide.

Even so, Mudawi isn't clamoring for military intervention. "Simply putting more troops, or better troops in, is not much of a solution," says Mudawi. "They will have some effect in lessening the violence, but only for a while. Look at what has happened with the African Union peacekeepers. At first they seemed effective, and within a few months they were being ambushed, having their jeeps stolen, and security got much worse." Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick does not dispute that assessment. "The African Union forces have done a tremendous job," he said last week. "But they came in to enforce a ceasefire, and that ceasefire has broken down." The AU's 7,000 peacekeepers--or even 20,000 U.N. troops--can't be expected to control a region larger than France.

The conflict in Darfur arose from a series of political disputes between two groups: the Arabs who make up the government-backed Janjaweed militia versus the region's non-Arab farmers. In 2002, the Janjaweed engaged in particularly bloody massacres, and the non-Arab tribes launched a rebellion against the dictatorship in Khartoum. The government responded by unleashing the Janjaweed, who since then have engaged in mass rapes, killings and lootings. Mudawi holds Khartoum squarely responsible for the atrocities. "The government of Sudan has taken advantage of political divisions... and is perpetrating crimes against humanity," he says. Nevertheless, he adds, there's no choice but to negotiate with the perpetrators: "The solution will have to be a political solution that addresses those divisions and, most important, that includes all the parties in Darfur."

Mudawi holds scant hope for the current peace talks in Abuja, Nigeria. "The parties from Darfur are not really represented," he says. "The Khartoum government is there, but it has no interest in having the talks succeed. Relatively few of the Janjaweed or the other tribes are there. And no one is representing the 2 million people who have been displaced and are living in camps. They have separate but crucial claims that have to be placed on the table." Mudawi wants talks with all major tribes represented. But, he argues, only the presence of a senior American figure at the table can offset the maneuverings of the Sudanese government. " Khartoum will try corruption, coercion, force, anything to derail such talks," he says. "Only international pressure could counteract this."

Peace in Darfur will certainly depend on talks between the groups who live there. Still, Mudawi and others who want an American at the table should recognize that the African Union and the United Nations might be more help. "If we're out there front and center, the bad guys will discredit the whole process by presenting it as 'American imperialism,' another attempt at regime change and a plot to occupy another Muslim country," says a senior administration official, asking to remain anonymous because of the talks' sensitivity. "That will retard our efforts to stop the bloodshed."

Could the people of Darfur really make peace after so much killing? "It happens everywhere," says Mudawi. "In Sudan in particular, we know that we are a country of tribes. We have to live together." After all, he says, decades of civil war in southern Sudan produced peace accords that are working now under the supervision of only a few dozen international monitors. Mudawi's message appears to be getting through at last. He visited the United States last week and got a receptive ear from the administration. On Thursday he met with President Bush, and the president made sure they were photographed together. Bush wanted to boost the Sudanesedissident's international visibility and send a warning to Khartoum. "I got the sense that Darfur is rising on the president's agenda. And I think he understands there needs to be a broader solution," says Mudawi. "I left the meeting with hope." But as he well understands, it will take more than hope. Even doing good requires a plan.

If Not Peace, Then Justice
The New York Times Magazine
by Elizabeth Rubin
April 2, 2006

I. A Day in Court for the Criminals of Darfur?

A thick afternoon fog enveloped the trees and streetlights of The Hague, a placid city built along canals, a city of art galleries, clothing boutiques, Vermeers and Eschers. It is not for these old European boulevards, however, that The Hague figures in the minds of men and women in places as far apart as Uganda, Sarajevo and now Sudan. Rather, it symbolizes the possibility of some justice in the world, when the state has collapsed or turned into an instrument of terror. The Hague has long been home to the International Court of Justice (or World Court), a legal arm of the United Nations, which adjudicates disputes between states. During the Balkan wars, a tribunal was set up here for Yugoslavia; it has since brought cases against 161 individuals. It was trying Slobodan Milosevic — the first genocide case brought against a former head of state — until his unexpected death last month. And now the International Criminal Court has begun its investigations into the mass murders and crimes against humanity that have been committed, and are still taking place, in the Darfur region of Sudan.

The Hague has become a symbol of both the promise of international law and its stunning shortcomings. We have reached a point in world affairs at which we learn about genocide even as it unfolds, and yet it is practically a given that the international community will not use military intervention to stop it. Militias called janjaweed, recruited from Arab tribes in Darfur and Chad and supported by the Sudanese government, continue to attack, rape and kill villagers from African tribes — more than 200,000 people have been killed in Darfur, and two million have fled their homes. For more than two years, politicians and activists have been shouting to the world that a genocide is unfolding in Darfur, calling it a slow-motion Rwanda in the hope that the shock of remembering the nearly one million people slaughtered in that African country in 1994 would prompt action. Coalitions of students, religious leaders and human rights groups have lobbied in Washington, have set up SaveDarfur.org and have made green rubber bracelets, now worn all over the United States, that quote George Bush recalling Rwanda and promising, "Not on my watch." Yet the killing rolls on, and no one intervenes to bring it to an end, as if the genocide in Darfur were already history.

... article continues here.

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Uganda (ICC)

Official Website of the International Criminal Court

Uganda: Too scared to return home
Reuters (IRIN)
March 21, 2006

Wilson Akera hates living in Padibe camp for internally displaced persons because life is generally unbearable but he is even more scared of the prospect of returning home soon as he believes insecurity is still rife in the villages.

"We are willing to go home and end this cycle of despair, but we are uncertain of our security," Akera said. "The area a few kilometres out of here is a den of the unknown. Groups of rebels still loiter there."

Akera is one of the 1.6 million-plus people who have been displaced by two decades of war between the Ugandan government and the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in northern Uganda. He has lived in Padibe camp for years, relying on aid agencies to survive. The camp is located in the northern Kitgum district - one of the areas worst hit by the rebellion.

Rose Agiro agreed that in spite of the bad conditions at Padibe, returning home, some 6 km away, was not a viable option. "We have no land around here for cultivation. I would prefer to return home and access my field, but there is no security. If I go back, the rebels are there and will abduct my children," she said. Conditions in the camp are tough for Agiro, 46, and her family of six. Water is in short supply, and there are not enough classrooms, creating overcrowding and putting pressure on the few available teachers.

Residents complained that their needs remained great. "More boreholes are needed, more classrooms, provision of agricultural implements is required," said a memorandum read to Dennis McNamara, head of the UN Inter-Agency Internal Displacement Division, who led a team of donors to evaluate the situation between 15 and 17 March. "There is need for the decongestion of the camps and more security," the memorandum added.

McNamara told reporters: "We need to break out of this prolonged humanitarian crisis. The conditions these people are living in are totally below any standards. They are unacceptable in terms of lack of assistance, lack of protection."

Ugandan authorities said the problem of decongesting the camps was being addressed through the creation of "satellite villages". Through this programme, military units have been established and people are encouraged to settle alongside them. However, local residents said the transition was very hard, as not enough supplies were available at the new locations.

Dure camp, further south of Kitgum town, is one new location, where aid workers are trying to cope with the situation. "This translates into changing our operations and increasing the logistics to deliver supplies to these new locations, a change that takes time," said one relief worker at the camp, where the European Union had just set up a solar-powered borehole in response to the water problem there.

Prepare to go home, says gov't

McNamara warned that any returns of the displaced to their villages must be voluntary. "We can only support that return if it is voluntary, if it is safe and if it is viable. If it is not, we will not be able to support if," he said.

Vincent Okongo, 60, who lives in Dure camp, insisted there had been no guarantee that the rebellion was ending. "Two days ago, we got reports of rebels passing nearby the camps, so we do not know what this means. The only good thing is that many are continuing to surrender to the army," he said.

Ugandan authorities insist that the rebellion is at its end and the displaced should prepare to start going home in April. "The army has defeated the LRA terrorism in the north and the peace prevailing now in southern Sudan has paved way for the return of the displaced persons to their homes," President Yoweri Museveni told a delegation from the United States that visited him over the weekend. He said that only 120 rebel fighters were remaining, and even they had fled from southern Sudan to Garamba National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Asked in an interview with the Ugandan Sunday Vision newspaper whether he thought the camps should be dismantled, the president answered, "The IDPs [internally displaced persons] are going home." Days earlier, his government said it would buy 259,000 roofing sheets to be distributed to returnees in the war-affected districts of Gulu, Kitgum, Kaberamaido, Apac, Katakwi, Pader, Kumi and Amuria. Each household would get 30 sheets to rebuild their home – a small start given the number of displaced families living in the camps.

Children most affected

At Padibe, according to 19-year-old Alex Akena, four children who had gone to gather mangoes had disappeared - most probably having been abducted by the LRA - one week before the UN delegation's visit. They represent only a tiny fraction of a particularly vulnerable group that has borne the brunt of the conflict. Children, perhaps more than anybody else, will live longest with brutal memories of the terror and abuse they suffered as captives of the LRA.

Irene Ajok, nine, is afraid to sleep at night. She said that if she slept, she might be abducted and forced to eat a human being, as her sister was almost made to do when the rebels abducted them. "They killed a person and ordered the freshly abducted children, including my sister, Lillian, to eat the body. They refused to eat that body, and she was made to carry a heavy load of sorghum for a long distance as a punishment," Ajok told IRIN at a night commuters' centre at a school in Kitgum. She is one of 400 children who seek refuge there every night.

Night commuters are children who, out of fear of LRA abduction, flee their home villages each night to sleep in the relative safety of larger towns. In the morning, they return to their villages. There are an estimated 40,000 night commuters in northern Uganda. The children said life as a night commuter was difficult, but better than living with the cruel treatment meted out by the rebels.

For many former abductees, the memories of atrocities committed by either their peers or LRA rebels torment them the most. Twelve-year-old Walter said he was never tortured or made to kill when he was abducted two years ago, but he had seen people having their heads cut off when they tried to escape. "Their eyes were looking at me," Walter remembered, speaking quickly in a monotone.

Rights groups and relief agencies estimate that the LRA has abducted at least 25,000 children to serve as fighters, porters and sex slaves since the rebellion started in northern Uganda in 1988.

The war drags on

The war, often described as the world's worst forgotten humanitarian crisis, has dragged on despite on-and-off attempts to pursue peace talks. Over time, the Ugandan military offensives have driven the rebels further underground and into neighbouring countries.

Last week, the Ugandan army claimed that LRA leader Joseph Kony had fled from bases in southern Sudan into eastern DRC. If true, said army spokesman Maj Felix Kuraigye, the elusive guerrilla leader's drawn-out violent campaign - ostensibly to replace Museveni's government with one based on the Biblical Ten Commandments - is waning.

Pressure on the rebels has also grown since 2005, when Kony and four top commanders were indicted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes, among them the "brutalisation of civilians by acts including murder, abduction, sexual enslavement (and) mutilations".

Uganda: War-Related Deaths in the North Very High - Report
AllAfrica.com: IRIN
March 30, 2006

Some 146 people die each week in the northern region where rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) have waged war against the Uganda government for two decades, charity groups said in a report published on Wednesday.

War-related deaths in the region are three times higher than the number of killings in Iraq since the United States-led invasion that toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 2003 - a death rate that represents 0.17 deaths per 10,000 people, compared with 0.052 per 10,000 in Iraq, according to the report, entitled "Counting the Cost: 20 years of war in northern Uganda". It was prepared by 50 aid agencies working in the region.

"Twenty years of conflict have had a devastating impact on children," said the Civil Society Organisations for Peace in Northern Uganda (CSOPNU) report, which was released as Jan Egeland, United Nations Under Secretary-General for humanitarian affairs, arrived in the country to discuss with Ugandan officials a new approach to the situation before visiting camps for the internally displaced in the north.

"Twenty five thousand children have been abducted during the course of the war, 41 percent of all deaths in the camps are amongst children under five [and] 250,000 children in northern Uganda receive no education, despite Uganda's policy of universal primary education. "An estimated 1,000 children have been born in LRA captivity to girls abducted by the rebel army. At the times of heightened insecurity up to 45,000 children 'night commute' each evening and sleep in streets or makeshift shelters in town centres to avoid being abducted by the rebel LRA," the report added.

" Northern Uganda is one of the world's worst war zones. [...] It is tragedy of the worst proportions. This conflict cannot be allowed to fester any longer. A peaceful resolution of this conflict must be found," said Stella Ayo-Odongo, CSOPNU chairperson.

"The economic cost of the war to Uganda after 20 years is 1.7 billion dollars," the report said. "This is the equivalent of double the UK's gross bilateral public expenditure on aid to Uganda between 1994 and 2001 or the United States' total aid to Uganda between 1994 and 2002."

The LRA is blamed for displacing more than 1.5 million people, forcing them to live in camps. Thousands of children have been abducted to serve in combat or become sex slaves to male rebel fighters. The Ugandan army's efforts to defeat the rebellion militarily have not been successful, and peace efforts by different groups have failed. Humanitarian agencies have asked for action from both the international community and the Ugandan government to end the crisis.

CSOPNU urged the UN Security Council to adopt a recommendation for the appointment of a panel of experts to investigate the activities of the LRA. "The appointment of a high level envoy to reinvigorate peace efforts, address all aspects of the crisis and report back to the UN Security Council on progress has also received widespread support though as yet no action has been taken," the coalition noted.

Uganda rebel 'terror' appals UN
BBC News
April 1, 2006

The activities of rebels in northern Uganda are "terrorism of the worst kind anywhere in the world", UN humanitarian affairs chief Jan Egeland has said.

Security must be improved in the region here Lord's Resistance Army rebels abduct children and carry out attacks, he said while visiting Pader district.

Mr Egeland urged the Ugandan government and international community to do more to end the humanitarian crisis.

Almost two million people have been displaced during 20 years of civil war.

They live in camps, often in appalling conditions, in attempts to escape attacks by the LRA. In addition, many thousands abandon their homes in rural villages every night for the relative safety of big towns.

In Pader district, the worst affected area of northern Uganda, Mr Egeland visited Patongo camp, a squalid home to about 40,000 people.

The BBC's Will Ross in Uganda said Mr Egeland did not hold back when assessing the situation, and described the current humanitarian relief effort as plasters on the wound.

"I don't think we really understand what it is when 90% of a population is terrorised into crammed camp conditions like this," Mr Egeland said.

"I just met a women's group where all of the women had had their children abducted, Most of them had never heard back from them."

Some of the camp's residents told Mr Egeland about the problems they face, which included inadequate healthcare and poor access to education.

But the worst problem was insecurity. Mr Egeland said that although the rebels had become weaker, they remained strong enough to prevent people from returning to their villages.

"Everybody has to do more," he said. "The government of Uganda has to do more, the army has to provide real security for the people, not only when they are inside cramped camps but when they go out of these camps.

"We as aid organisations have to also improve conditions. Still too many are dying from lack of sanitation, lack of proper care."

Former LRA child fighters needed to be reintegrated and the rebel leaders brought to justice, he added.

Reintegration

As residents were telling Mr Egeland they did not feel it was safe enough to go home, the Ugandan military said it was clashing with pockets of rebels in the same district.

Our correspondent says the problem is how to end the war. Negotiations with the senior commanders seem to be out of the question as they have been indicted by the International Criminal Court, he adds.

Mr Egeland said ending the insecurity was his hope for 2006. But he said he did not think there was a purely military solution. He pointed to the insecurity caused by small groups of rebels and the fact the rebels were mainly abducted children.

"We are not wanting all the LRA killed - these are children, abducted children of these women around us.

"They should be able to demobilise and be reintegrated into society and I think it can happen," he told the BBC.

After meeting Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni on Friday, Mr Egeland said it was positive news the government of Uganda was acknowledging the situation more than it had previously, and was promising action.

On Sunday, the UN humanitarian affairs chief will visit southern Sudan, which is also blighted by Ugandan LRA attacks.

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Iraqi High Tribunal

Official Website of the Iraqi High Tribunal
Grotian Moment: The Saddam Hussein Trial Blog

UN calls on Iraq’s Government to assert control as killings and torture increase
UN News Centre
March 22, 2006

The United Nations today called on Iraq’s Government to urgently assert control over the security forces and all armed groups in the war-torn country, saying February’s attack on a shrine in Samarra had led to a worsening situation, resulting in hundreds of cases of killings, torture, illegal detention and displacement.

“Throughout the reporting period, insurgent activities, including terrorist acts, intensified after 22 February and continue to affect the civilian population,” says the bi-monthly rights report by the UN Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) covering the first two months of this year.

“Allegations that ‘death squads’ operate in the country grew stronger following the discovery by the Multi-National Forces in Iraq (MNF-I) and the Iraqi Security Forces of a suspicious group, acting within the structures of the Ministry of Interior,” the report says.

It also points out that “families living in mixed neighbourhoods were forcibly evicted from their homes or left voluntarily because of threats of violence from militias, insurgents and other armed groups,” adding that civilians – “especially women and children” – continue to bear the brunt of the human rights violations.

Following the destruction of the Shia Shrine in Samarra, the report notes that “serious incidents of violence erupted in and around Baghdad, in Basra as well as in other parts of the country,” and in retaliation a significant number of Sunni mosques were reportedly attacked “and clerics were among those assassinated.”

“Street clashes and assaults by armed groups continued for days. Many individuals were reportedly detained at improvised checkpoints, or were abducted from homes and mosques,” it adds.

The report also says that the Ministry of Interior announced that 249 people had been killed from 22-25 February, figures that “reflect a new high in a trend that has been steadily increasing and provide an important indicator of the absence of protection of the right to life which still prevails at this time in Iraq.”

UNAMI is continuing to receive reports that minorities, including Palestinians, Syrians and Sudanese, are still suffering human rights violations, and also that Christians, among other religious groups, “continue to live in fear.”

The seven-page report also emphasizes throughout UNAMI’s apprehension over the treatment of detainees in Iraq, adding that international law and best practice must be upheld.

UNAMI has repeatedly expressed concerns to relevant members of the Government about allegations of systematic human rights violations in detention centres under the direct or indirect control of the Ministries of Interior and Defence.

Justice: Talking Trash
Newsweek
by Rod Nordland
March 27, 2006

Saddam Hussein had a point when he described his trial as a "farce." In five months of proceedings, the Iraqi High Tribunal has managed only 17 actual court days amid tight security, hunger strikes and boycotts by lawyers. Assassins have killed a judge, a court employee and two defense attorneys. At one point Saddam's codefendant, Barzan al-Tikriti, the once feared head of the Mukhabarat intelligence service, came to court in his underwear. The ex-dictator himself complained of having guards watch him take his pants down to use the toilet during recesses. Saddam's appearance last week brought a new low, with the prosecutor and defense lawyers screaming at one another, and the chief judge repeatedly hitting a red button that cut off the mike as Saddam declared himself not only president, but "commander in chief of the mujahed [holy warrior] armed forces." Finally the judge closed the hearing, threw out the press and shut down TV transmissions—all as Saddam ranted on.

Saddam's diatribes were better informed than they had been in previous court appearances. Held in solitary confinement since his capture in December 2003, Saddam has had little contact with the world beyond his cell. His American jailers strictly purged his reading material of any news about events in Iraq. But since the trial began, Saddam has been allowed to see attorneys, and on Wednesday he made the most of the information he was getting, praising the resistance while calling on Iraqis to avoid civil war. "Let the people unite and resist the invaders and their backers," he said at one point. "Don't fight among yourselves." The chief judge hit the red button and silenced the audio feed, but Saddam's speech was still audible in the courtroom. "The invaders and their supporters know they're on their certain way to being swept out, like the trash they are."

Lost in the chaos was the case itself. Saddam and his seven codefendants are on trial for the executions of 148 Shiites in the village of Dujail, in reprisal for a failed 1982 assassination attempt on Saddam as his motorcade passed by the village. Of all the accusations against Saddam, it's a relatively small one—but one where the alleged chain of responsibility is well documented. By his own statements, Saddam has tied himself to the reprisals, saying in court on March 1 that he had personally ordered the Dujail villagers tried—and their orchards razed—for an ambush that involved only 20 attackers. "Where is the crime?" Saddam declared. "[Since when] is trying a suspect accused of shooting at a head of state a crime?"

The Saddam-era trial, before the Revolutionary Court in 1984, is the heart of the prosecution's case, which maintains it was a sham. Forty-six of the defendants were "liquidated under torture" —before they were recorded as appearing at the trial. Eleven of the accused were minors, one as young as 12. A few years after the trial, Saddam's officials discovered that the kids had never been executed because of their ages. "We recommend executing them in a secret manner," reads one document. There's an arrow from that sentence to the margin, where Saddam allegedly wrote "Yes. It is preferable that they are buried by the Mukhabarat."

Saddam could well be executed soon after the Dujail case ends, without waiting for other cases against him to proceed. The defense still has a chance to make its arguments, which could extend well into the summer. But once a verdict is rendered by the five-judge panel, "if any defendant were sentenced to any penalty, no matter whether it were the death penalty or imprisonment, that penalty should be executed within 30 days of the court's verdict," chief prosecutor Jafar al Musawi told NEWSWEEK. Although there would be an automatic appeal of a death sentence to the court of cassation, that court has no backlog of cases, Musawi says, and an appeal "would only take days."

Many more cases involving Saddam could follow—if he's still alive. Already, charges are being prepared in the poison-gas attacks against Kurds in Halabja, the wider Anfal massacres and the slaughter of Shiites after an abortive uprising in 1991. But if Saddam doesn't hang for Dujail, the other 12 cases being prepared against him could, at the present rate, take more than a decade to try. Even many Iraqis unhappy with the American occupation wouldn't like that. "I think most Iraqis share the opinion that I have," said Ahmed Taha, 42, a Sunni primary-school teacher from Babylon. "Let's get done with it and execute him."

At one point in last week's trial, after Saddam quieted down and apparently agreed to address the Dujail charges, the judge pressed the green button to switch on his audio. But the defendant soon rounded on him: "If it were not for the Americans, neither you nor your fathers would have been able to bring me here." It was then that the judge declared the trial closed to the public. Shia politician Ali al Dabbagh was in the visitors' gallery. "Saddam was trying to pass messages to the insurgents and encourage them to attack," he said. "The judge had to stop this." With months more to go, Saddam's only defense is to make a mockery of the entire proceeding. So far, he's succeeding.

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International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY)

Official Website of the ICTY

Press Briefing of the ICTY
Alexandra Milenov, Liaison Officer for Registry and Chambers, made the following statement: (partially reproduced below):
March 29, 2006

…In terms of the courtroom schedule, closing arguments in the trial against Bosnian Army officer Naser Oric will start on Monday, April 3 until Thursday, April 6 at 9:00 and at 2:15 on Friday, April 7 in courtroom I. As a reminder for tomorrow 9:00 in Courtroom I, there will be a regular status conference in the case against a number of the highest-level leaders of the Bosnian Croat wartime entity, and one of the Republic of Croatia, the Prlic et al. case. A further initial appearance of Milan Lukic, a Bosnian-Serb paramilitary leader, will take place on March 31 at 9:00 in courtroom I. The accused will be asked to enter a plea on charges in the amended indictment.

A status conference will also be held in the case against some of the highest-level Serb and Yugoslav political military and police leaders, Milutinovic et al. case, on Friday, March 31 at 10:00 in courtroom III. (Accused are on provisional release). There will be a regular status conference in the case of nine accused charged with crimes committed in Srebrenica in 1995, the Popovic et al. case on Tuesday, April 4 at 2:15 in courtroom I. The trial against Milan Martic, a high-level political leader of the war-time Croatian Serb entity, continues this Thursday and Friday at 9:00 in courtroom II. The trial continues next Monday and Tuesday at 9:00 in Courtroom III and Wednesday and Thursday at 2:15 in courtroom I. The trial against Yugoslav Army officers Mile Mrksic, Miroslav Radic and Veselin Slivancanin continues this Friday at 9:00 in courtroom I. It will sit next Monday and Tuesday at 2:15 in courtroom I and in courtroom II on Wednesday through Friday at 9:00. The trial against Momcilo Krajisnik, a former high-level leader of the Bosnian Serb political entity, will continue this week on Thursday and Friday afternoon at 2:15 in courtroom II. The trial will sit next Monday at 2:15 in courtroom II and Tuesday through Friday at 9:00 in courtroom II.

Press Release of the ICTY: Appeals Chamber Confirms Milomir Stakic's Conviction
Carla Del Ponte, Prosecutor
March 22, 2006

The Tribunal’s Appeals Chamber today confirmed the conviction of Milomir Stakic, the leading political figure in the Bosnian municipality of Prijedor, for crimes committed there in 1992 and sentenced him to 40 years in prison.

On July 31, 2003, the Trial Chamber found Milomir Stakic, the former President of the Prijedor Municipal Assembly, guilty of participating in the murder, extermination and persecutions (incorporating deportation) of non-Serbs in Prijedor in 1992. The Trial Chamber held Milomir Stakic responsible for more than 1,500 killings and identified 486 victims by name. For these crimes the Trial Chamber sentenced him to life imprisonment, the maximum penalty. Both the Prosecution and the Defence appealed the Trial Chamber’s judgment. Milomir Stakic also appealed his sentence. In addition, the Appeals Chamber, in accordance with the Tribunal’s Rules of Procedure and Evidence, considered certain issues of its own initiative. Most of the Appeals Chamber’s findings relate to specific legal issues.

In its judgment, the Appeals Chamber affirmed the Trial Chamber’s decision to convict Milomir Stakic for his responsibility in exterminating, murdering and persecuting the non-Serb population in Prijedor. The Appeals Chamber also found that the Trial Chamber incorrectly failed to convict him for deporting and forcibly transferring the non-Serb population. The Appeals Chamber agreed with the Trial Chamber’s decision to acquit Milomir Stakic of genocide and complicity in genocide.

One of the issues the Appeals Chamber addressed of its own initiative was how to legally define Milomir Stakic’s responsibility for the crimes he committed. The Appeals Chamber found that Milomir Stakic participated in a joint criminal enterprise whose purpose was to commit crimes against the Bosnian Muslim and Bosnian Croat populations of Prijedor. These crimes were part of a campaign to persecute the non-Serb population of Prijedor, with the final goal of creating a Serbian municipality eventually to form part of an envisaged pure Serbian state. The Appeals Chamber found that the Trial Chamber committed some errors in determining Milomir Stakic’s sentence. However, it also found that the impact of these errors on the sentence is very limited.

Milomir Stakic is one of 14 accused convicted of crimes committed in Prijedor.

The Summary of the Judgment can be found on the ICTY website at: http://www.un.org/icty/stakic/appeal/judgement/sta-summ060322e.htm

Dinamo Zagreb to collect money for war crimes suspect
Agence France Press - Todayonline.com
March 24, 2006

Croatian first division side Dinamo Zagreb said they would donate the money earned during their last match in the country's championship to the defence of a former general in custody at the UN war crimes court in The Hague.

"The club's management has decided to donate the money to be collected from the last match's tickets to the foundation" for the defence of Croatians charged by the UN tribunal, Dinamo Zagreb's spokesman Adolf Kozul told AFP.

The match, during which Dinamo Zagreb is to host their long-standing rivals Hajduk Split, is due to be played on May 13.

The club expects to sell some 35,000 tickets and thus collect some 150,000 euros (180,000 dollars).

The foundation was created in February with the aim to collect money to finance the defence of Croatians charged by the UN court, notably former general Ante Gotovina.

Gotovina was detained in December in Spain after being on the run for more than four years.

The UN court charged him with war crimes against ethnic Serbs during the 1991-95 Serbo-Croatian war.

He is seen as a national hero by many in Croatia.

Croatia's proclamation of independence from the former Yugoslavia in 1991 sparked the war with Belgrade-backed rebel Serbs who opposed the move. — AFP

The match, during which Dinamo Zagreb is to host their long-standing rivals Hajduk Split, is due to be played on May 13.

Lost in Translation: Critics say law on transferring tribunal cases to the Bosnia war crimes court is contradictory and inaccurate.
Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN)
by Nidzara Ahmetasevic
March 31, 2006

The law allowing the transfer of cases and evidence from the Hague tribunal to the Court of Bosnia and Hercegovina is full of inconsistencies and errors, Justice Report has learned.

The legal mistakes, which were accepted by the Bosnian government in 2004, could cost the court millions of marks and result in considerable lost court time. Experts say some mistakes come from bad translations and others from poor knowledge of domestic legislation.

View article here.

EU extends deadline for Mladic handover
The Guardian (UK)
March 31, 2006

The European Union today gave Serbia until April 30 to hand over suspected war criminal General Ratko Mladic to a UN tribunal in The Hague.

The announcement, extending a previous deadline by a month, came after UN war crimes prosecutor Carla Del Ponte reported progress on Serbian efforts to capture the genocide suspect.

If Serbia does not meet the new deadline, Brussels could suspend talks paving the way to Serbian membership of the EU.

Ms Del Ponte has repeatedly claimed that Gen Mladic, wanted on genocide charges, is hiding in Serbia and that the Serbian authorities could arrest him if they wanted to.

But EU enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn said today that Ms Del Ponte had reported progress in Serbia's cooperation with the UN court in The Hague.

Gen Mladic is indicted with Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic over the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of 8,000 Muslims, and the 43-month siege of Sarajevo in which more than 11,000 people died.

Earlier today, Serbia's deputy prime minister called for an emergency meeting of the country's top leaders to help hasten Gen Mladic's arrest.

Mrioljub Labus urged prime minister Vojislav Kostunica and president Boris Tadic to hold a meeting of the National Security Council "to establish civilian control over all military and police secret services".

Mr Tadic responded angrily to the suggestion.

"I do hope that Mr Labus did not dare accuse me for not doing enough" regarding cooperation with the UN court, Mr Tadic told a Belgrade radio station.

"If anyone is encouraging cooperation with the tribunal, that is me."

Mr Labus, Mr Kostunica and Mr Tadic belong to different political parties.

Serbia-Montenegro's foreign minister, Vuk Draskovic, yesterday claimed that the country's secret service knew where Gen Mladic was hiding, but had failed to apprehend him because some security force members remained loyal to him.

The EU has warned Belgrade to do more to hunt down suspected war criminals if it wants to join the 25-nation bloc.

Brussels used similar tactics to get Croatia to comply with the Hague tribunal, freezing membership talks until Zagreb cooperated with efforts to find indicted war criminal General Ante Gotovina. He was found hiding in the Canary Islands.

During a visit by Ms Del Ponte to Belgrade on Wednesday, Serbian officials asked her to show understanding for the "complex political situation" there and not urge the suspension of EU talks, Reuters reported.

The phrase was a coded warning that ultranationalists could oust the moderate government if it rushes to cooperate with the UN tribunal, where former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic died earlier this month while on trial.

The EU and Belgrade began talks on a so-called stabilisation and association agreement, the first rung on the ladder to EU membership, on November 7 2005. Accession is not expected until 2015 at the earliest.

Rssn diplomat says Hague tribunal must be disbanded by 2010
ITAR-TASS
April 1, 2006

The Hague International Tribunal for War Crimes in the former Yugoslavia has failed to live up to the expectations pinned on it, since its activity is biased and its procedures revealed an anti-Serb accusatory tendency from the very start, Russia’s deputy ambassador to the UN, Ilya Rogachov, told Itar-Tass Friday.

“Serbs make up 80% of people the Tribunal has made charges against,” he said.

He spoke to Itar-Tass after a UN Security Council briefing on the conditions for convicts in Scheveningen prison outside The Hague.

Russia requested the information on conditions there after several cases of deaths among people under investigation kept there, the list of which includes former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic and the former leader of Croat Serbs, Milan Babic.

Rogachov said the UN Security Council conceived The Hague Tribunal “as an instrument of peace settlement in the Balkans that was supposed to scale down tensions there.”

“We can state, however, it never reduced the tensions,” he said. “On the contrary, it fanned passions in that boiling region of the world, and that’s why it clearly failed to perform its duties.”

Rogachov indicated that the Tribunal, an agency with a huge staff of about 1,100 people, has been operating for 13 years and its budget for 2006 and 2007 stands at around 300 million U.S. dollars.

“That’s too expensive, and its efficiency obviously doesn’t match its costs,” he said.

In 2003, the UN Security Council adopted a strategy of completion of the Tribunal’s functions that envisioned termination of all investigative actions in 2004, the ending of first-instance trials by 2008, and reviewing of appeals by 2010.

Rogachov said, however, top officials at the Tribunal have demanded a revision of the strategy, saying they cannot meat the specified deadlines.

“ Russia and some other members of the Security Council tell them it’s impossible to revise that strategy, but our position only got firmer after the incident with Slobodan Milosevic,” Rogachov said.

“We believe the Tribunal must be disbanded by 2010 regardless of whether or not the leaders of Bosnian Serbs, Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadjic are seized and brought to The Hague,” he said.

“The conflict in the Balkans is settled now, the passions have calmed down and there’re no obstacles towards transferring the defendants’ cases to national courts in Serbia and Montenegro, Croatia and Bosnia,” Rogachov said.

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International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR)

Official Website of the ICTR

Country Working On Waiving Death Penalty for UN Court Suspects, Says Official
AllAfrica.com - Hirondelle News Angency (Lausanne)
March 20, 2006

The Rwandan government is working on details of a law to waive capital punishment for any genocide suspects that might be transferred to its courts from the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), Rwanda's permanent envoy to the court said on Sunday.

"Our position on the issue of the death penalty was made clear by the president, we are ready to remove the death penalty for suspects from the ICTR. All that is left now are the details we are working on", said Aloys Mutabingwa.

Mutabingwa was responding to a question on a talk show broadcast by Kigali's Radio Contact.

The death penalty has been a major issue of contention in the negotiations to hand over genocide suspects in ICTR custody to Rwandan courts.

Officials in Rwanda have on occasions given conflicting positions on the matter with some denying that Rwanda would accede to the ICTR's demands of guaranteeing that none of the suspects would be subject to capital punishment.

The ICTR is scheduled to close all trials at first instance in 2008. The court has been looking for countries ready to take on some trials such that it can meet the deadline.

Rwanda and Norway are the only countries that have so far indicated interest in handing the trials.

Government II - Trial Disrupted By Lack of Witnesses Only Two Days After Resumption
AllAfrica.com - Hirondelle News Angency (Lausanne)
March 23, 2006

The trial of four former Rwandan cabinet ministers was on Wednesday disrupted by lack of witnesses only two days after it resumed before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).

The trial chamber had to adjourn the trial abruptly to Friday after it was informed that there were no witnesses to testify in defence of former minister of commerce Justin Mugenzi who is currently presenting his case.

The tribunal's witness and victims support section (WVSS) had not brought the witness scheduled to testify because a travel request by an officer from WVSS had not been processed by the travel unit.

The lead defence counsel for Mugenzi Ben Gumpert (UK) told the court that the officer from WVSS was unable to escort the witness who lives in a neighbouring country, because the ICTR's travel unit said the travel request notice he gave on March 16th was too short.

An officer from WVSS explained to the court that it was not possible to get the witnesses to Arusha in time because of delays from the travel unit.

But Gumpert said his team had issued the list of witnesses and particulars of residence to the WVSS as of July 2005.

There are unanswered questions here," Gumpert said.

The presiding judge, Khalida Rachid Khan asked the WVSS to ensure there are at least five witnesses present in Arusha every week.

"We shall be unhappy to hear that proceedings are held up for non-availability of witnesses," said Judge Khan.

The other accused in the case are the former minister for health Casimir Bizimungu, former minister for foreign affairs, Jerome Bicamumpaka and former minister for public service Prosper Mugiraneza.

They have pleaded not guilty to charges of genocide and crimes against humanity. Their trial commenced 3 November 2003.

Defence lawyer says witnesses on both sides can't be trusted to tell the truth
The Toronto Star
by Karen Palmer
March 26, 2006

Unlike the Nuremberg trials of Nazi officials after World War II, there is virtually no documentary evidence showing directives, orders or even a clear chain of command in the Rwandan genocide of 1994.

At the ICTR — the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, now holding court in Arusha — prosecutors instead rely mainly on three types of witnesses: big shot "insiders" who have traded their testimony for a plea bargain; average Rwandans now serving jail sentences for killing or raping during the genocide; and survivors, whom prosecutors characterize as the most genuine, since they have nothing to gain through their testimony.

But Peter Robinson, a defence lawyer from California, complains that both prosecution and defence at the tribunal seem to repeatedly run up against lying witnesses.

"Here, it's just rampant," says Robinson.

"I don't know exactly why. Maybe it's a character thing — it may be the culture of Rwanda. Maybe the witnesses need to incriminate authorities of the previous regime."

The Arusha court — in northeastern Tanzania near Mount Kilimanjaro and the Kenyan border — has become a strange tourist magnet, drawing in foreign spectators with a day to fill before heading out on safari.

For the most part, spectators remember the images of crying babies standing amid buzzing flies and piles of bodies and still can see in their mind's eye the seemingly endless line of Rwandan refugees trudging like zombies toward the Congo border.

But tribunal testimony seems to challenge memories of the genocide.

One woman tells a horrifying tale in a soft and childish voice about being beaten, shot at and raped before finally being rescued by Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front rebels.

But cross-examination reveals gaping holes in her story and it soon becomes clear that what she tells the court probably happened throughout Rwanda — just maybe not to her.

It stretches believability, Robinson says, that peasants come to court and say they saw government ministers execute Tutsis or heard generals order exterminations.

It may seem callous, but he wonders how these terrified survivors — most of them uneducated peasants, some of them playing dead beneath a pile of bodies — could pick out an important face or understand military commands.

One Tutsi witness, a former rebel known as BBB signed an affidavit saying he attended at least three meetings, orchestrated by a Rwandan survivors group called Ibuka, where witnesses plotted false testimony.

Another says he listened from his living room while an Ibuka representative dictated the evidence his wife would give.

In some cases, the prosecution paid witnesses, ostensibly for travel-related expenses.

"Witness G," a former leader of the Interahamwe — the Hutu militias blamed for killing thousands of fleeing Tutsi and Hutu moderates at roadblocks — admitted in court last Oct. 24 that he received $30,000 (all figures U.S.) in cash from the prosecution, explaining it was for helping build cases against Hutus.

Another Interahamwe leader, "Witness T," admitted he received $16,000.

"These payments were laundered through the United States government" and were subject to approval and review by a lawyer in Colorado, states a motion filed by Robinson asking the judges to order prosecutors to disclose payments to witnesses.

The motion was rejected when three judges decided "an oral hearing to investigate these allegations would be no more than a fishing expedition."

The integrity of the court is not only important for history, but for the future, says Gregory Stanton of Genocide Watch.

If alleged war criminals are not seen as receiving fair trials, he says, the results will simply be dismissed, leaving the door open for denials.

"The ICTR is far from perfect," Stanton says of the tribunal. "But as I have argued many times before, perfection is the enemy of justice.

"And the ICTR is, by and large, rendering justice to the small number of people it is able to try."

Tanzania Asked to Prosecute Genocide Suspects After ICTR Mandate
AllAfrica.com - Hirondelle News Agency (Lausanne)
March 27, 2006

Tanzania is likely to take over the responsibility of prosecuting Rwandan genocide suspects whose trials under the current International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) will not be completed by the year 2008.

"The Tribunal's leadership has asked the Tanzanian government to complete prosecuting genocide suspects after its mandate", said Dr. Mary Nagu, Tanzanian minister of Justice in a telephone interview with Hirondelle News Agency on Friday.

The minister's remarks followed a meeting she held with the top officials of the Tribunal including its President Judge Erik Mose (Norway), the Chief Prosecutor Hassan Bubacar Jallow (Gambia) and the Registrar Adama Dieng (Senegal).

The United Nations Security Council had directed the Tribunal to complete trials in the coming two years and appeal cases by 2010.

Dr. Nagu said her ministry would look into the matter, after receiving a formal request, because extensive preparations were necessary before accommodating this international obligation.

She said preparations may include resources like manpower, financial support from the international community and an examination of whether Tanzanian law allow the prosecution of someone who has committed a crime in another country.

The ICTR Spokesperson, Tim Gallimore, on Friday had no information about the outcome of the meeting between the Tanzanian minister and top tribunal officials.

The three leaders of ICTR last week held also a meeting with the Tanzanian president Jakaya Kikwete in Arusha.

The Tribunal has so far completed cases involving 26 accused, while cases involving 27 others are ongoing and 15 accused are awaiting trial.

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Liberia Truth and Reconciliation Commission

Handcuffed Taylor deposited at war crimes court
IRIN Africa
March 29, 2006

UN peacekeepers delivered handcuffed former Liberian president Charles Taylor into the custody of a UN-backed Special Court in Sierra Leone on Wednesday where he will be the first former African head of state to face prosecution for war crimes before an international tribunal.

A UN helicopter brought Taylor from the Liberian capital Monrovia directly to the landing pad of the Special Court in Freetown where officials whisked him directly to his waiting cell.

Nigerian police captured Taylor, who is indicted on 17 counts of war crimes, on Tuesday after he disappeared from the mansion where he was living in exile in the south of the country.

Taylor was detained Tuesday night in Borno state in northeastern Nigeria, Information Minister Frank Nweke told reporters. Authorities immediately informed Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo who is on a visit to the United States and the Nigerian leader ordered Taylor’s immediate deportation to Liberia.

“Taylor was received as soon as he landed and the UNMIL peacekeepers read him his rights and he was handcuffed by peacekeepers,” Liberia’s chief prosecutor, Tiaon Gongloe told reporters after Taylor’s departure in a white UN helicopter.

A UN Security Council resolution late last year mandated UN peacekeepers in Liberia “to apprehend and detain former president Charles Taylor” in the event of his return to Liberian territory and depose him with the Special Court in Sierra Leone.

“It is a triumph for international justice,” said Gongloe, also a former human rights activist imprisoned under Taylor where he was tortured and suffered severe internal bleeding.

Warlord-turned-president Taylor stepped down as elected leader of Liberia in 2003 and accepted exile in Nigeria under intense international pressure led by the United States. His departure cleared the way for a ground-breaking peace deal that ended 14 years of brutal on-off civil war that killed tens of thousands of Liberians and displaced millions.

“God willing, I will be back”

At his departing speech Taylor, dressed head to toe in white, vowed to return to Liberia, and the Nigerian plane that flew Taylor into Monrovia on Wednesday was much like the one that collected him to begin his exile less than three years ago.

Repeated attempts by Taylor’s lawyers to get the Special Court to drop the charges against him have failed and Court officials recently told IRIN that they are ready and waiting to receive him.

Nigeria had always maintained that it would hand Taylor over from exile only at the request of an elected Liberian government. That request came earlier this month while new Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was visiting the United States – Liberia’s main potential donor to help rebuild the war-battered country and a key proponent of the drive to get Taylor before the Special Court. Nigeria followed up with an announcement that Liberia was “free to take” the former president.

But before arrangements could be made for his transfer, Taylor slipped off in a car on Monday night and waiting commandos swooped in and took him to vehicles standing by to help him make his way to the northeast town of Gambouru near the Cameroon border, Nigerian officials said. But Taylor, loaded with cash, was arrested before he crossed the border.

International applause

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, US President George Bush and human rights activists welcomed news of Taylor’s detention saying in part that it sent a clear message to other leaders that they are not above the law.

“I think his capture and being put on trial does not only close a chapter, but it also sends a powerful message to the region that impunity will not be allowed to stand, and would-be warlords will pay a price,” Annan said at UN headquarters in New York. “And I think this is relevant, not just for what happened in Sierra Leone and Liberia, but in other parts of the region and the continent.”

President Bush who met with Nigerian President Obasanjo at the White House on Wednesday also stressed the regional importance of Taylor’s trial. “The fact that Charles Taylor will be brought to justice in a court of law will help Liberia and is a sign of your deep desire for there to be peace in your neighbourhood," Bush told Obasanjo before reporters.

Human rights groups working for Taylor’s arrest said his capture means his victims could finally see justice done.

“Today there is a tremendous amount of both relief and hope. Relief that an indicted war criminal accused of having wrought great suffering throughout West Africa is finally where he belongs, and hope because justice for the victims of these crimes is now in reach,” said Corinne Dufka, West Africa representative of Human Rights Watch.

And Alhaji Ahmed Jusu Jarka, who had both his hands cut off by Taylor-backed rebels in Sierra Leone, is looking forward to seeing Taylor in the dock.

“I will raise my hands to show him what he did to the people of Sierra Leone,” said Jarka, head of the Amputees and War Wounded Association of Sierra Leone. “This is what we have been looking forward to…Everybody is anxious to see him and to see the Special Court try him.”

Unease in Freetown

Only this week many Sierra Leoneans said the very existence of the Special Court and Taylor’s presence could threaten to the country’s stability.

“I personally did not want the Special Court to be set up here at the beginning when I thought of the security threat it could bring. After 11 years of war there are still some sore wounds and bringing Charles Taylor here is a huge security threat. He still has plenty of supporters back in Liberia,” said 25-year-old student Victor Bangura. He is particularly concerned about security since the departure in December of the UN peacekeeping force known as UNAMSIL that restored order in Sierra Leone at the end of more than a decade of brutal fighting.

“We had huge confidence, for the most part, in [UNAMSIL]. If they were here now we would be very confident that things would be fine.”

Tribunal Asks Dutch to Host Taylor Trial
The Guardian (UK)
by Anthony Deutsch (AP)
March 30, 2006

The special tribunal for Sierra Leone has asked the Netherlands to host the war crimes trial of former Liberian President Charles Taylor, the Foreign Ministry told The Associated Press on Thursday.

Ministry spokesman Dirk-Jan Vermeij said the court's request to The Hague-based International Criminal Court argued that holding the trial outside Sierra Leone could help stability in the region.

"The Netherlands is willing to agree under certain conditions,'' including that Taylor leave the country following a verdict, Vermeij said. Another condition would be a U.N. Security Council resolution saying the trial should be held in The Hague to establish "a sound legal basis'' for the move.

Taylor is charged with backing Sierra Leone's rebels during a brutal war from 1991-2002. He was captured Tuesday in northeastern Nigeria while trying to cross the border into Cameroon. He was being held in a tribunal detention facility in Freetown.

Peter Andersen, spokesman for the Sierra Leone tribunal, stressed the trial would be conducted by "the special court of Sierra Leone sitting in The Hague,'' and not by the international court. He said the tribunal is awaiting a response to its request.

ICC spokesman Ernest Sagaga confirmed the request from Sierra Leone but said he had no details. "There is no provision for that under the statute, but it will be considered by the court,'' he said.

The ICC was created in 2002 but detained its first suspect only this month.

The Netherlands is the venue for several international tribunals, including the war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, which tried Slobodan Milosevic until his death on March 11.

War criminals convicted at the Yugoslav tribunal are sent to prisons in other countries to serve their sentences. They remain at a U.N. detention center in the Netherlands while on trial.

Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said the court in The Hague would be a "more conducive environment'' for Taylor's trial.

The Hague has hosted international judicial organs for more than 100 years since the creation in 1900 of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, which evolved after World War II into the International Court of Justice, also known as the world court.

If approved, the Taylor trial would be held at a courtroom opened just weeks ago at the ICC's temporary quarters in a former telecommunications building in Voorburg, a suburb of The Hague.

The ICC, the world's first permanent war crimes court, first used the high-tech courtroom just nine days ago when it brought a former Congolese warlord, Thomas Lubanga, before a judge for an initial appearance.

Security Council extends mandate of Liberia peace mission through September
UN News Centre
March 31, 2006

Awaiting further recommendations for a drawdown of troops following positive developments in Liberia, the Security Council today extended the mandate of the United Nations Mission in that country (UNMIL) until the end of September.

By a unanimously adopted resolution, the Council also prolonged the temporary increase in UNMIL’s staffing ceiling to a total of 15,250 military personnel until that same date to ensure that the support provided to the special court trying war crimes in Sierra Leone did not reduce UNMIL’s strength in Liberia during its critical transition period following a long and brutal civil war.

In his latest report to the Security Council, which deals specifically with recommendations for the UNMIL drawdown, Secretary-General Kofi Annan says that despite “considerable overall improvement” in security, the mission was still needed to help cement peace and stability.

In the report, Mr. Annan recommends reductions in UNMIL’s military component, but advocates police strength be increased at the same time, to provide “a reliable security umbrella” for the new Government led by Ellen Sirleaf Johnson to fully establish its authority and to give the Liberian Police Support Unit experience it needs to eventually take over from UNMIL.

Britain Backs Request to Move Liberian's Trial to The Hague
The New York Times
by Warren Hoge
April 1, 2006

Britain circulated a draft resolution to Security Council members on Friday that would transfer the war crimes trial of Charles G. Taylor, the former Liberian president, to the Netherlands because of what it said was a threat to regional peace posed by his continued presence in West Africa.

Under its terms, Mr. Taylor would be tried in the International Criminal Court complex in The Hague under the auspices of the United Nations-backed court that was established in Sierra Leone to try people suspected of responsibility for atrocities during the country's civil war, from 1991 to 2002.

Mr. Taylor was indicted by that court in March 2003, while still president of Liberia, on 17 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity. He had been living in exile in Nigeria from August 2003 until Wednesday, when he was arrested while trying to flee to Cameroon and flown to Sierra Leone.

Mr. Taylor is accused of backing rebels who, in a civil war that killed 50,000 people, gained grisly notoriety for raping victims and maiming and killing people by chopping off their arms, legs, hands, ears and lips.

The draft resolution said Mr. Taylor's presence in West Africa constituted "an impediment to stability and a threat to the peace of Liberia and of Sierra Leone, and to international peace and security in the region."

The plan to move the proceedings to The Hague came at the request of the Sierra Leone court.

Mr. Taylor, 58, a warlord turned president, has many loyalists in the region and was able to maintain contact with them while in Nigeria.

His arrest and detention in Sierra Leone were put into motion two weeks ago when Liberia's new president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, formally asked President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria to extradite him.

The resolution asks the Netherlands to allow unrestricted access to the court for witnesses and others required for the trial. It also would exempt Mr. Taylor from the travel ban that currently blocks his passage to Europe.

Asked about the transfer plan, Secretary General Kofi Annan told reporters, "I think everybody agrees it to be wiser to do that."

At the State Department, Adam Ereli, the deputy spokesman, said the United States backed the action as "frankly, in the interests of the court and the defendants and those connected with the trial." He said, "It is a move that reinforces, I think, justice, transparency and fairness."

A statement from the tribunal in Sierra Leone on Friday said Mr. Taylor would make his first public appearance in court there on Monday.

On Thursday, lawyers from the court's defense office met with Mr. Taylor and said he had been cooperative as they explained his rights to him and "addressed personal matters as well as detention-related issues," according to the statement. It also said, "Mr. Taylor is in fairly good health and is in good spirits."

British officials said they expected the resolution to be formally considered early next week.

Profile -- Charles Taylor: Africa's monster
The Independent (UK)
by Paul Vallely
April 1, 2006

Click here for the article.

For more articles pertaining to Liberia and Charles Taylor, see the Sierra Leone section.

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