War Crimes Prosecution Watch

Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC)

Official Website of the Extraordinary Chambers
Official Website of the Khmer Rouge Trial Task Force
Official Website of the United Nations Assistance to the Khmer Rouge Trials (UNAKRT)

Justice Initiative Calls on Khmer Rouge Court to Fix Human Resource Problems
Open Society Justice Initiative Press Release
By David Berry
October 5, 2007

~ Additional Steps Needed to Address Flaws Revealed in Audit ~

New York, October 5, 2007—The Open Society Justice Initiative today welcomed the public release of a United Nations audit highlighting serious flaws in hiring and other personnel practices at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC). The ECCC must immediately and credibly address these flaws if it expects donors to continue supporting the court, the Justice Initiative said.

The audit, commissioned by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)—the UN body charged with overseeing international donor funds earmarked for the Cambodian side of the ECCC's budget—found that ECCC human resource management was inadequate by nearly every measure. Most importantly, the audit, released publicly this week, found that a significant portion of the staff hired by the Cambodian side of the ECCC did not meet the minimum job requirements defined by the court. Regrettably, the audit did not address allegations that Cambodian ECCC staff were required to kick back a percentage of their salaries in exchange for their jobs.

"The ECCC must take immediate action to address the problems exposed by the audit and to pro-actively combat the possibility for corrupt practices to occur," said Robert O. Varenik, acting executive director of the Open Society Justice Initiative. "Releasing the audit is an important step for the court, but will do little to effect needed reform unless further steps are taken to fix the court's flaws."

Specifically, the Justice Initiative recommended the court take the following steps:

• Institute the best anti-corruption practices used in other international and hybrid tribunals;
• Install an experienced ombudsperson to whom employees and officials can confidentially report inappropriate requests for payment or any other violations of employment practices or ethical conduct;
• Hire only qualified staff who meet minimum job requirements for all key positions in the court.
The ECCC is about to begin a fundraising drive to generate additional support for its operations. The Justice Initiative urges prospective donors to play a key role in making sure the ECCC takes the necessary action to improve its practices by:
• Conditioning future funding on the court's effective efforts to address the problems highlighted in the UNDP audit and to produce demonstrated results;
• Mandating regular and transparent financial reporting by both UNDP and the ECCC;
• Insisting on unified, transparent, and professional hiring practices and reporting structures.

"The ECCC needs to convince donors and the public that it is willing to take the steps necessary to address the challenges it confronts," said Varenik. "It cannot settle for superficial solutions."

Former Khmer Rouge Leader Denies Responsibility for Crimes During his rule
International Herald Tribune/Associated Press
October 7, 2007

BANGKOK, Thailand: The Khmer Rouge's former foreign minister, Ieng Sary, said Sunday he believes he is next to face charges by a U.N.-backed genocide tribunal, but denied responsibility for the deaths of some 1.7 million people during the group's rule of Cambodia in the late 1970s.

After arriving at Bangkok's international airport, he said he heard about the speculation on the radio earlier Sunday as he headed to the airport in Phnom Penh, Cambodia's capital.

"I have done nothing wrong," Ieng Sary, believed to be 77, said of his years with the Khmer Rouge regime.

"I am a gentle person. I believe in good deeds. I even made good deeds to save several people's lives (during the regime). But let them (the tribunal) find what the truth is," he said without elaborating.
He was in Thailand to receive a checkup for a heart condition, he said.
Surviving Khmer Rouge leaders have typically claimed innocence in the crimes committed when their communist group held power in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979.
The group's radical policies caused the death of an estimated 1.7 million people from starvation, illness, overwork and execution.

Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot died in 1998, and his former military chief, Ta Mok, died in 2006 in government custody.

The tribunal's prosecutors have recommended five former Khmer Rouge leaders for trial. So far, only two of them — Nuon Chea, the former Khmer Rouge ideologist, and Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch who headed the former Khmer Rouge S-21 torture center — have been detained on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The other three suspects have not been publicly named. But Ieng Sary, who lives freely in Cambodia but in declining health, is widely believed to be on the prosecutors' list.

Ieng Sary, dressed in khaki pants, shirt and hat, flew on a Bangkok Airways flight with a Cambodian aide.

When he arrived in the Thai capital, he had to be pushed in a wheel chair, while his aide carried a walker.

Ieng Sary said he was visiting a Bangkok hospital for a regular heart checkup and would return to Cambodia in a few days.

"My heart is not functioning well following previous surgeries. My health is my big concern now," Ieng Sary said.

How UNDP Comes Clean
The Wall Street Journal
September 27, 2007

If the United Nations Development Program in Cambodia wants to clear its name, it sure has a funny way of showing it. On the day this page detailed allegations of widespread hiring malpractice and kickbacks in UNDP-supervised programs and called for the publication of the findings of an audit, the agency released -- wait for it -- a one-page press release.

For those just joining the tale, a quick review: An audit commissioned by UNDP earlier this year found a range of irregularities in the Cambodian side of the Khmer Rouge tribunal. The main findings included inflated salaries and unjustified additional staff positions to the tune of $357,000. The auditors also alleged a serious conflict of interest in the board overseeing the operations, which is responsible for administering more than $6 million of donor-nation funds. We've seen a copy of the auditors' draft report. The UNDP has not made it or the final report public nor has it shown it to the oversight board.

Tuesday's joint statement, issued by UNDP and other overseers, assures the public that the board has "reviewed steps taken to improve the implementation of recruitment procedures of national staff to ensure greater transparency and effectiveness." Nowhere does it note that the board has not seen the audit, nor does it discuss conflicts of interest. And nowhere does it pledge to reveal the audit to the public, which is footing the bill.

Instead, the board "welcomed the adoption of a personnel manual" and promises that all employees will "sign" and "follow" a code of conduct. This document prohibits staff from "receiving or soliciting payments other than salaries for the performance of official duties." Could this be a tacit admission of kickback problems?

Cambodia isn't an easy place to operate and its legal system is notoriously corrupt. On Monday, the New York-based Open Society Justice Initiative -- whose allegations last year sparked the UNDP audit -- issued a report raising concerns about the Cambodian government's influence over the Khmer Rouge tribunal. The same day, another part of the U.N. -- the U.N. Assistance to the Khmer Rouge Trials -- issued a list of work to be done before the courts can function properly.

The Khmer Rouge tribunal took a decade to organize and represents the only hope for justice for more than a million slaughtered Cambodians. Next month, the U.N. is planning to launch a fund-raising drive in New York to raise tens of millions of dollars to support the court's activities. Before writing a check, potential donors have a responsibility to their funders to know what is really going on.

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Central African Republic

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents - Cases: Central African Republic

Countries must enforce indictments of war crimes court, Liechtenstein tells UN
UN News Service
October 1, 2007

The creation of the International Criminal Court (ICC) has been “the crowning success” of recent progress towards the rule of law and global justice, Liechtenstein’s Foreign Minister told the General Assembly today, but that achievement must be backed up by arrests of all the people indicted by the Court.

Rita Kieber-Beck called on the UN and all Member States to cooperate with the ICC to ensure that the arrests are made and the indictees are brought to The Hague in the Netherlands, where the Court is based, for trial.

So far the ICC has issued arrest warrants for two suspects accused of war crimes in Darfur and five leaders of the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in northern Uganda, but none have been arrested.

The Darfur indictees are Ahmed Muhammad Harun, currently the Minister of State for Humanitarian Affairs, and Janjaweed militia leader Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman, also known as Ali Kushayb. The LRA indictees are the leader Joseph Kony, and commanders Vincent Otti, Okot Odhiambo, Dominic Ongwen and Raska Lukwiya.

Thomas Lubanga, a rebel militia leader in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), was arrested last year, while the Prosecutor’s Office has begun to probe of allegations of killings and rapes in the Central African Republic (CAR).

Ms. Kieber-Beck said the Security Council’s decision to refer the situation in Darfur – where more than 200,000 people have been killed and at least 2.2 million others forced to flee their homes since 2003 – “was a landmark decision, both legally and politically.

“It was a strong message by the Security Council that the international community does not accept impunity for the most serious crimes under international law.”

But the Foreign Minister stressed that this message needs to be backed by enforcement action on the suspects who remain at large.

Central African Republic welcomes UN mission but urges more aid
UN News Service
October 1, 2007

A senior official from the Central African Republic (CAR) today welcomed the recent establishment of a United Nations-mandated, multidimensional presence in the country but said it must be accompanied by assistance to bolster national capacity there.

Addressing the General Assembly’s annual high-level debate, CAR Minister for Foreign Affairs Côme Zoumara hailed the adoption of Security Council resolution 1778. Unanimously passed on 25 September, that text set up a mission to help protect civilians and facilitate humanitarian aid to thousands of people uprooted due to insecurity in CAR, Chad and neighbouring Sudan.

At the same time, he stressed that the operation, to be known as MINURCAT, must be accompanied by real support to reinforce the CAR’s own institutional capacities.

The conflict in Darfur, as well as the presence of rebels, armed groups and roadblocks and the proliferation of light arms, has combined to foster a “generalized and permanent” insecurity in the region, he said.

As a result, CAR has faced recurrent crises which chronically tear at the country’s economic fabric, exacerbating conditions of poverty endured by the country’s people, he said.

On the general economic situation, he said CAR was working to develop its economy in a manner consistent with the principles of sustainable development, engaging in regional cooperation toward that end.

The CAR is open to private and public investments from other States, he said, thanking those which have responded positively, including France, the United States, China, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Russian Federation, and a number of countries in the South.

Thanking also international financial institutions such as the African Development Bank, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), he appealed to them to “turn a new page on the environment and economies of poor countries.”

Four rebel groups reject political dialogue in CAR
Afrique En Ligne
October 12, 2007

Paris, France (PANA) - Four rebel groups in Central African Republic (CAR) have rejected moves by President Francois Bozize to engage them in a political dialogue.

The rebel groups - the Union of the Republican Forces (UFR) , the People's Army for the Restoration of the Republic (APRD), the Central African Movement for Justice (MLCJ) and the Central African Democratic Front (FDC) - said in a press statement Thursday the call for dialogue was a "new farce".

In the statement, made public in Paris, the groups said conditions for a real political dialogue had not yet been established in the country.

"The agreement signed in a rush and which essentially deals with the number of people who must take part in preparations for the dialogue and the choice of its chairman is just a farce," said the rebel groups.

They said instead a serious and transparent dialogue open to all national protagonists of the deep political, humanitarian and security crisis in the country should be arranged.

"The political dialogue can only take place after an international mediator accepted by all the protagonists is appointed", the groups said.

President Bozize recently inaugurated a 23-member committee, including members of the opposition parties and the civil society, to prepare grounds for the dialogue.

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Democratic Republic of the Congo (ICC)

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents - Situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Opposition Wants Gen Kabarebe Transferred to France
Rwanda News Agency/Agence Rwandaise d'Information (Kigali), via AllAfrica.com
October 1, 2007

As an Interpol member, the Democratic Republic of Congo has the legal obligation to arrest Gen. James Kabarebe and to extradite him to France, where he is under criminal investigation, controversial UDF-Inkingi said on Monday.

The Netherlands based group wants all concerned police officials from France, DRC and Interpol to comply with their national and international legal obligations and to bring to book Gen Kabarebe.
The Rwanda defense Forces chief arrived in the DRC's capital Kinshasa yesterday to attend an extraordinary Tripartite Plus military chiefs meeting, scheduled to take place in Lubumbashi this week.

Gen. Kabarebe is among nine Rwandan officials subject of arrest warrants issued by Anti-terrorist Jean-Louis Bruguière on charges of shooting down of Rwanda presidential jet on the night of April 6, 1994.

The arrest warrants led to the severing of relations between France and Rwanda but moves are ongoing to mend them.

On the list also includes: Lt Gen. Charles Kayonga - Land Force Chief of Staff, Lt Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa - envoy to India, Brig. Jackson Nkurunziza a.k.a Jack Nziza - d of Political Education (J5) and Gen. (rtd) Samuel Kanyamera - now member of parliament.

Others are Col. (rtd) Jacob Tumwine, Franck Nziza, Eric Hakizimana and Rose Kabuye, a.k.a Rose Kanyange, director general of State Protocol.

"The UDF-Inkingi is convinced that there will be no lasting peace and no stability in the Great Lakes Region if all those crimes remain unpunished", the group said in a statement.

"The UDF-Inkingi believes that if justice continues to be delayed or denied, no reconciliation will be possible, an unavoidable pre-requisite to reconstruction and shared economic growth in that part of the African continent".

It says Interpol should act on the Rwandan officials as it did with former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori - who was arrested and later extradited to Peru from Chile on September 24.

Meanwhile, Generals Charles Kayonga and Jack Nziza have petitioned a Belgian court demanding the warrants against them be quashed and disregarded with damages of up to 62.5million Euros each.

Court set September for the start of the proceedings. Media reports from Belgium indicate that Judge Bruguiere was not in court but would testify by video conference link up.

In France, Samuel Kanyemera (Sam kaka), retired Col. Rose Kabuye (Kanyange) and Jacob Tumwine have also gone to court in Paris demanding that the warrants are thrown out.

Trial date uncertain
The Mercury
October 02, 2007

THE HAGUE: Judges at the young International Criminal Court were hoping to hold the tribunal's first-ever trial - that of war crimes charges against Congolese warlord Thomas Lubanga, in mid-February next year.

"Our tentative proposal is a date somewhere around mid-February," said presiding Judge Adrian Fulford.

Lubanga's trial would be the inaugural one for the court, which became operational mid-2002. The court is the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal.

It is not clear when the judges will decide on a definite trial date. Yesterday, they questioned the prosecution and the defence about matters that might influence the start of trial, such as disclosure of evidence and witness protection measures.

In January this year, the court ruled that there was sufficient evidence against Lubanga, accused of recruiting and using child soldiers, to go ahead with a trial.

Lubanga has denied all charges. He has also tried to play down his role in the armed wing of his political Union of Congolese Patriots, one of six principal movements that emerged during ethnic conflicts that have ravaged the DRC's eastern Ituri region since 1999. - Sapa-AFP

Rape Epidemic Raises Trauma of Congo War
New York Times
By Jeffrey Gettleman
October 7, 2007

BUKAVU, Congo — Denis Mukwege, a Congolese gynecologist, cannot bear to listen to the stories his patients tell him anymore.

Every day, 10 new women and girls who have been raped show up at his hospital. Many have been so sadistically attacked from the inside out, butchered by bayonets and assaulted with chunks of wood, that their reproductive and digestive systems are beyond repair.

“We don’t know why these rapes are happening, but one thing is clear,” said Dr. Mukwege, who works in South Kivu Province, the epicenter of Congo’s rape epidemic. “They are done to destroy women.”

Eastern Congo is going through another one of its convulsions of violence, and this time it seems that women are being systematically attacked on a scale never before seen here. According to the United Nations, 27,000 sexual assaults were reported in 2006 in South Kivu Province alone, and that may be just a fraction of the total number across the country.

“The sexual violence in Congo is the worst in the world,” said John Holmes, the United Nations under secretary general for humanitarian affairs. “The sheer numbers, the wholesale brutality, the culture of impunity — it’s appalling.”

The days of chaos in Congo were supposed to be over. Last year, this country of 66 million people held a historic election that cost $500 million and was intended to end Congo’s various wars and rebellions and its tradition of epically bad government.

But the elections have not unified the country or significantly strengthened the Congolese government’s hand to deal with renegade forces, many of them from outside the country. The justice system and the military still barely function, and United Nations officials say Congolese government troops are among the worst offenders when it comes to rape. Large swaths of the country, especially in the east, remain authority-free zones where civilians are at the mercy of heavily armed groups who have made warfare a livelihood and survive by raiding villages and abducting women for ransom.

According to victims, one of the newest groups to emerge is called the Rastas, a mysterious gang of dreadlocked fugitives who live deep in the forest, wear shiny tracksuits and Los Angeles Lakers jerseys and are notorious for burning babies, kidnapping women and literally chopping up anybody who gets in their way.

United Nations officials said the so-called Rastas were once part of the Hutu militias who fled Rwanda after committing genocide there in 1994, but now it seems they have split off on their own and specialize in freelance cruelty.

Honorata Barinjibanwa, an 18-year-old woman with high cheekbones and downcast eyes, said she was kidnapped from a village that the Rastas raided in April and kept as a sex slave until August. Most of that time she was tied to a tree, and she still has rope marks ringing her delicate neck. The men would untie her for a few hours each day to gang-rape her, she said.

“I’m weak, I’m angry, and I don’t know how to restart my life,” she said from Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, where she was taken after her captors freed her.

She is also pregnant.

While rape has always been a weapon of war, researchers say they fear that Congo’s problem has metastasized into a wider social phenomenon.

“It’s gone beyond the conflict,” said Alexandra Bilak, who has studied various armed groups around Bukavu, on the shores of Lake Kivu. She said that the number of women abused and even killed by their husbands seemed to be going up and that brutality toward women had become “almost normal.”

Malteser International, a European aid organization that runs health clinics in eastern Congo, estimates that it will treat 8,000 sexual violence cases this year, compared with 6,338 last year. The organization said that in one town, Shabunda, 70 percent of the women reported being sexually brutalized.

At Panzi Hospital, where Dr. Mukwege performs as many as six rape-related surgeries a day, bed after bed is filled with women lying on their backs, staring at the ceiling, with colostomy bags hanging next to them because of all the internal damage.

“I still have pain and feel chills,” said Kasindi Wabulasa, a patient who was raped in February by five men. The men held an AK-47 rifle to her husband’s chest and made him watch, telling him that if he closed his eyes, they would shoot him. When they were finished, Ms. Wabulasa said, they shot him anyway.

In almost all the reported cases, the culprits are described as young men with guns, and in the deceptively beautiful hills here, there is no shortage of them: poorly paid and often mutinous government soldiers; homegrown militias called the Mai-Mai who slick themselves with oil before marching into battle; members of paramilitary groups originally from Uganda and Rwanda who have destabilized this area over the past 10 years in a quest for gold and all the other riches that can be extracted from Congo’s exploited soil.

The attacks go on despite the presence of the largest United Nations peacekeeping force in the world, with more than 17,000 troops.
Few seem to be spared. Dr. Mukwege said his oldest patient was 75, his youngest 3.

“Some of these girls whose insides have been destroyed are so young that they don’t understand what happened to them,” Dr. Mukwege said. “They ask me if they will ever be able to have children, and it’s hard to look into their eyes.”

No one — doctors, aid workers, Congolese and Western researchers — can explain exactly why this is happening.

“That is the question,” said André Bourque, a Canadian consultant who works with aid groups in eastern Congo. “Sexual violence in Congo reaches a level never reached anywhere else. It is even worse than in Rwanda during the genocide.”

Impunity may be a contributing factor, Mr. Bourque added, saying that very few of the culprits are punished.

Many Congolese aid workers denied that the problem was cultural and insisted that the widespread rapes were not the product of something ingrained in the way men treated women in Congolese society. “If that were the case, this would have showed up long ago,” said Wilhelmine Ntakebuka, who coordinates a sexual violence program in Bukavu.

Instead, she said, the epidemic of rapes seems to have started in the mid-1990s. That coincides with the waves of Hutu militiamen who escaped into Congo’s forests after exterminating 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus during Rwanda’s genocide 13 years ago.

Mr. Holmes said that while government troops might have raped thousands of women, the most vicious attacks had been carried out by Hutu militias.

“These are people who were involved with the genocide and have been psychologically destroyed by it,” he said.

Mr. Bourque called this phenomenon “reversed values” and said it could develop in heavily traumatized areas that had been steeped in conflict for many years, like eastern Congo.

This place, one of the greenest, hilliest and most scenic slices of central Africa, continues to reverberate from the aftershocks of the genocide next door. Take the recent fighting near Bukavu between the Congolese Army and Laurent Nkunda, a dissident general who commands a formidable rebel force. Mr. Nkunda is a Congolese Tutsi who has accused the Congolese Army of supporting Hutu militias, which the army denies. Mr. Nkunda says his rebel force is simply protecting Tutsi civilians from being victimized again.
But his men may be no better.

Willermine Mulihano said she was raped twice — first by Hutu militiamen two years ago and then by Nkunda soldiers in July. Two soldiers held her legs apart, while three others took turns violating her.

“When I think about what happened,” she said, “I feel anxious and brokenhearted.”

She is also lonely. Her husband divorced her after the first rape, saying she was diseased.

In some cases, the attacks are on civilians already caught in the cross-fire between warring groups. In one village near Bukavu where 27 women were raped and 18 civilians killed in May, the attackers left behind a note in broken Swahili telling the villagers that the violence would go on as long as government troops were in the area.

The United Nations peacekeepers here seem to be stepping up efforts to protect women.

Recently, they initiated what they call “night flashes,” in which three truckloads of peacekeepers drive into the bush and keep their headlights on all night as a signal to both civilians and armed groups that the peacekeepers are there. Sometimes, when morning comes, 3,000 villagers are curled up on the ground around them.

But the problem seems bigger than the resources currently devoted to it.

Panzi Hospital has 350 beds, and though a new ward is being built specifically for rape victims, the hospital sends women back to their villages before they have fully recovered because it needs space for the never-ending stream of new arrivals.

Dr. Mukwege, 52, said he remembered the days when Bukavu was known for its stunning lake views and nearby national parks, like Kahuzi-Biega.

“There used to be a lot of gorillas in there,” he said. “But now they’ve been replaced by much more savage beasts.”

Comment: Lubanga Just a “Small Fish”
Institute for War and Peace Reporting
By Eugène Bakama Bope
October 11, 2007

Regardless of whether Lubanga is tried in DRC, many here feel it’s time the ICC indicted bigger Congolese war crime suspects.

The International Criminal Court, ICC, is considering the possibility of holding some of the Thomas Lubanga trial in the Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC. This praiseworthy initiative has some advantages but also difficulties.

Among the advantages is the necessity to bring international justice closer to the population concerned by international crimes. It is in the country where crimes have been committed that the victims, suspects and evidence are located. It is therefore legitimate and easier that justice be rendered where the crimes have been committed. Also, holding trials in the Congo educates the whole society and allows the work of the ICC to be made credible.

Lubanga was the president of the Union of Congolese Patriots, UPC - a militia whose objective was to protect the interest of the Hema ethnic group in the Ituri region. This group was involved in ethnic massacres, acts of torture and rapes.

He was transferred to the ICC on March 17 and charged with war crimes, including the recruitment of child soldiers. Judges confirmed the charges in January, and we are now expecting the trial.

The ICC will have to make all necessary efforts to explain to the inhabitants of the DRC the important legal procedures which are currently taking place in The Hague.

So why not do that by holding part of the trial in the Congo itself?

For one thing, the security situation in the northeast could lead the ICC to give up this idea to organise part of the Lubanga trial here.

It would be difficult, perhaps impossible, for the Congolese government to ensure the security of all parties during a trial in Ituri, even with the intervention of MONUC, the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo. How can the victims and witnesses be protected?

That’s why some observers propose that the trial be held in the capital city Kinshasa.

The arrest and transfer of Lubanga to the ICC triggered great hopes for victims in particular and the Congolese population in general.

However, Lubanga is for us a “small fish” compared to others who continue to enjoy impunity in the Congo.

The “big fish” are not bothered by international or national justice. This is the reason why the population is sceptical about the ICC.

Indeed, the Congolese people hope that the big fish will be held accountable for their deeds before the ICC, but the reality in the field causes doubts.

Crimes were committed in Ituri with the blessing of some of the militia leaders of the region. All these persons are not involved in any legal procedure so far and some of them are even members of the new national army.

Human Rights Watch said in its 2002 Ituri report that acts of cannibalism, rape and massacres were committed by armed groups notably Ngili and Lendu militias, Hema forces of the UPC, and the RCD-N (Rassemblement Congolais pour la Démocratie- National) and the RCD-ML (Rassemblement Congolais pour la Democratie - Mouvement de Liberation ).

The ICC still hasn’t issued any arrest warrants against Lendu militia leaders, despite their alleged involvement in a number of serious crimes. And the public is still waiting, after three years, for the names of other people who could be targeted by international arrest warrants.

“There is no justice anymore in our country”, is a cry that constantly comes from the people. What stability, what future can be expected in a nation where citizens do not trust justice anymore?

It is clear that to build a democratic and peaceful society, the DRC will have to overcome huge challenges. One of the most important will be to fight against the tradition of impunity.

The question for the ICC is whether it will be able to help with those challenges ahead by hitting higher and harder.

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Darfur, Sudan (ICC)

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents - Situation in Darfur, Sudan

Sudan releases Darfur war crime suspect wanted by ICC
Sudan Tribune
By Wasil Ali
October 2, 2007

The Sudanese government disclosed for the first time that a Darfur war crimes suspect wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) was released from detention.

Sudan’s foreign minister Lam Akol revealed in press statements yesterday that Ali Mohamed Ali Abdel-Rahman, also known as Ali Kushayb was freed due to lack of evidence against him.

The Sudanese government was believed to have been holding Kushayb in custody since November for what they described as “suspicion of violating Sudanese laws” and that he was under investigation for criminal acts in Darfur.

The judges of the ICC issued their first arrest warrants for suspects accused of war crimes in Sudan’s Darfur region in early May.

The warrants were issued for Ahmed Haroun, state minister for humanitarian affairs, and militia commander Ali Kushayb. Sudan has so far rejected handing over the two suspects.

The warrant for Haroun lists 42 counts including murder, torture and persecution, while the warrant for Kushayb lists 50 counts including murder and intentionally attacking civilians.

Akol reiterated that Sudan is not party to the ICC and as such has no obligation to cooperate with it.

The news of Kushayb’s release is likely to anger ICC officials and human rights groups who allege that he led attacks against civilians. Kushayb has been nicknamed as the “Butcher of Darfur” by Darfur refugees.

"We have eyewitnesses who saw Kushayb on his horse giving instructions in each of the cases. I have eyewitnesses who saw Kushayb involved in the execution of prisoners, the rape of women," the ICC Chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo said in statements earlier this year.

Last month Sudan appointed the second war crime suspect Ahmed Haroun as head of a committee investigating human rights complaints in Darfur, a move criticized by human right groups.

Sudan has not ratified the Rome Statue, but the UN Security Council triggered the provisions under the Statue that enables it to refer situations in non-State parties to the world court if it deems that it is a threat to international peace and security.

Jimmy Carter faces down security in Darfur
The Associated Press via the International Herald Tribune
October 3, 2007

EL FASHER, Sudan: Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter vowed Wednesday he would hold world powers to their pledge of ending the "crime against humanity" taking place in Darfur by deploying a strong peacekeeping force and ensuring democratic elections.

Nobel Peace laureates Carter and Desmond Tutu of South Africa headed a delegation known as "the Elders" made up of respected international figures seeking to promote peace. The group made Darfur in western Sudan its first mission.

"I'm just a retired politician, but I'll certainly do my best to remind the international community it must fulfill its commitments," toward ending Darfur's crisis, Carter said in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press on Wednesday as he was ending his tour of the war-torn Sudanese region.

While describing the conflict, which has claimed 200,000 lives and resulted in more than 2.5 million refugees as a crime, Carter said he disagreed with U.S. George W. Bush and others who call it a genocide.

"Rwanda was definitely a genocide; what Hitler did to the Jews was; but I don't think it's the case in Darfur," said the former president. "I think Darfur is a crime against humanity, but done on a micro scale. A dozen janjaweed attacking here and there," he said, noting that fact that so many refugees have survived the violence.

"I don't think the commitment was to exterminate a whole group of people, but to chase them from their water holes and lands, killing them in the process at random," he said. "I think you can call it ethnic cleansing."

Carter deplored that it had taken such a long time for the international community to mobilize over Darfur, since the conflict erupted in 2003 when ethnic Africans rebelled against the government, charging it with neglect.

"Because of Iraq, this crisis had been simmering at a lower level," Carter said. "But now, I don't think the attention will wane."

Carter did go out of his way to praise Bush for his efforts to end in 2005 Sudan's other great conflict, the two-decade old civil war between the north and south.

"I urged Bush on his inauguration day to change policy and seek peace in Sudan," Carter said. "I disagree with Bush on just about everything else, but I give him credit for bringing peace in Sudan."

During his tour of Darfur, Carter got a taste of the Sudanese regime's interference with those seeking to help ethnic African civilians when a local state security official barred him from meeting a refugee delegate in the town of Kabkabiya in North Darfur, a stronghold of the pro-government janjaweed militias accused of the worst atrocities.

Carter later played down the incident, saying the Sudanese national security official had "only been doing his job."

"But it's true that I'm not accustomed to people telling me I can't walk down the street and meet people," Carter said after having returned to a United Nations compound in El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur state.

Most of the community leaders the mission met during its two-day visit to Darfur appeared to be government-vetted, and several ethnic African delegates told AP they had been intimidated by authorities into turning down invitations from the Elders.

The government denies it has indiscriminately retaliated against ethnic African civilians in the course of putting down the rebellion, but the International Criminal Court in The Hague has issued warrants against a Sudanese cabinet minister and a janjaweed chief on 52 counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes.

The Elders' visit came at a crucial time for Darfur, with a peacekeeping mission of 26,000 United Nations and African Union troops set to come in, and new peace talks between the government and rebels due to begin later this month.

On Sunday, 10 peacekeepers from the current AU force were slain when rebels overran their base in Haskanita, some 150 kilometers south east of El Fasher.

Gen. Martin Agwai, the AU troops' commander, told the Elders that the 7,000-strong force was ill-equipped to fight off the attackers. Agwai said it had also taken over 12 hours to evacuate injured peacekeepers from Haskanita because the AU currently doesn't have its own helicopters.

Tutu said it was "awful" that the AU had come to pacify a region nearly the size of France without the proper gear, funds or armament. The Elders vowed to push for countries to support to the new, hybrid U.N.-AU force due to take over on Jan. 1, and said they would draw up a list of advice for the new Darfur peace talks in neighboring Libya, which Carter anticipated would be "a very difficult process."

"These are important benchmarks ahead of us," Carter said, emphasizing that Sudan's most crucial next step was general elections across the country. The elections are due in 2009 according to a peace agreement signed between Sudan's government and rebels in the south of the country ending the long civil war.

Observers fear that delayed elections could lead to a breakdown in the peace agreement.
Carter, who turned 83 upon his arrival in Khartoum on Sunday, said he met with Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, who had committed to holding the elections on time and invited international observers from his foundation, the Carter Center, to monitor the vote.
Al-Bashir also announced Khartoum had committed US$100 million (€70 million) to a Darfur reconstruction fund, with China pledging another US$200 million (€140 million), Carter said.
Despite all the problems between northern and southern Sudan, Carter said he was convinced neither side was willing to go back to war.

"The elections are a crucial point, both for the stability of southern Sudan and the improvement of Darfur," he said.

The Carter Center has monitored 68 elections worldwide so far, and its founder said he was confident it could help make the vote a success throughout Sudan, even Darfur.
But he questioned the commitment of al-Bashir, who was brought to power in a military and Islamist coup in 1989. "When people have been in power for so long, and in an authoritarian regime like this one, they don't want to endanger their power," the former president said.

Town razed after occupation by Sudanese troops
The Guardian (London)
By Xan Rice
October 8, 2007

A Darfur town where rebels attacked an African Union base and killed 10 peacekeepers last week has been razed in an apparent retaliatory attack. The United Nations Mission in Sudan (Unmis) yesterday confirmed that Haskanita had been "burned down, except for a few buildings". The mission apportioned no blame, but noted that the town was "currently under the control of the government".

On Friday, rebel leaders claimed that government troops and allied militias had torched Haskanita, near the border of north and south Darfur, killing dozens of civilians and displacing thousands to nearby towns. At the time the allegations could not be verified. In its daily briefing yesterday, Unmis, which visited Haskanita to assess the humanitarian situation, confirmed the displacement, saying that only a few civilians had returned in search of food and water. The main market had been looted.

"We are not saying who did what to whom," said an Unmis spokesperson in Khartoum. "That is the job of the ceasefire commission chaired by the African Union."

There was no immediate reaction to the report from the Sudanese government, which had been involved in fierce fighting against the rebels in the Haskanita area before the attack on the African Union base on September 29. The late night raid by a rebel splinter group, which killed seven Nigerians and soldiers from Mali, Botswana and Senegal, was the deadliest since the peacekeepers were deployed in 2004. Government troops took control of the town within hours of the rout.

The attack threw into question peace talks between the Sudanese government and the main rebel groups which are scheduled to take place in Libya on October 27. It also highlighted the vulnerability of the international peacekeepers, who are outgunned and outmanned by the warring factions. The rebel attackers in Haskanita were said to number about 1,000 men. The entire peacekeeping force in Darfur, a region the size of France, is only 7,000 strong.

A "hybrid" African Union-UN force with 26,000 troops is meant to take over the peacekeeping mission, but is still months away from deployment. While Khartoum has agreed in principle to the scale-up, critics say that it has done little to end the fighting and to punish those responsible for mass killings in Darfur.

Only last week, Sudan announced that Ali Muhammad Al Abd-Al-Rahman, known as "Ali Kushayb", a government-allied militia leader who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes, had been freed from prison for lack of evidence. A second accused, Ahmad Muhammad Harun, has retained his post as state minister of humanitarian affairs.

‘Dozens dead’ in Sudan Darfur raid
Al Jazeera
October 9, 2007

At least 40 civilians were killed in a Sudanese air and ground assault on the Darfur town of Muhajiriya, according to the rebel group that controls the area.

"Until now the number of dead civilians are at least 40, with 80 missing and a large number of injured," said a statement by the faction of the Sudan Liberation Army that controls the area.

"Bodies are still lying around the town as this statement is written," said Mohamed Hamid Dirbeen, the military spokesman for the Minni Minnawi faction of the Sudan Liberation Army, Reuters reported.

The group said at least four fighters were also killed in Monday's operation, AFP reported.

Martin Luther Agwai, the commander of African Union peacekeepers in Darfur, said civilians converged on their base nearby for safety.

His troops treated about two dozen injured civilians and combatants, but did not allow them to enter the base.

Minni Minnawi was the only one of three rebel negotiating groups to sign a May 2006 peace deal with Khartoum.

'Stab in the back'

After the signing of the May 2006 peace deal with Khartoum, the movement became part of the government.

Dirbeen said on Monday the raid was a "stab in the back of the Darfur peace agreement".

A UN official said Monday's attack and charges by rebels that troops had razed another Darfur town and killed 100 people in retaliation for an attack on African Union troops last month, showed the need to provide a planned UN-AU peacekeeping force with sufficient mobility and firepower.

Jean-Marie Guehenno, head of UN peacekeeping operations, said he was "very concerned" with the escalating violence in Darfur less than three weeks before scheduled peace talks in Libya.

The talks in Tripoli on October 27 are to encourage other factions to sign up to peace.

"At this stage, we cannot formally confirm any particular responsibility but it's very troubling that the city which was under the control of the government of Sudan could be burnt down," Guehenno said.

The French diplomat added that the incident "shows the importance of having troops that are very mobile, with the capacity to dominate any situation".

Darfur, in western Sudan, has suffered widespread fighting since 2003, killing about 200,000 people and forcing 2.5 million from their homes.

SUDAN: Darfur attackers "committed war crimes"
IRIN (Nairobi)
October 12, 2007

The attackers who killed 10 African Union (AU) peacekeepers in the volatile western Sudan region of Darfur committed a war crime and should be investigated to bring them to book, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said.

"Deliberately attacking peacekeepers is a war crime," said Peter Takirambudde, HRW’s Africa director. "The Sudanese government and the rebel groups should cooperate fully with an independent investigation into the dreadful attack in Haskanita."

According to aid workers, unidentified men attacked an AU base in Haskanita, North Darfur, killing the men on 29 September. Some policemen were also attacked while other troops were kidnapped. Most were from Nigeria.

Describing the attack as heinous, the chairman of the AU commission, Alpha Oumar Konaré, said investigations were under way to identify the attackers.

Nigerian army spokesman Colonel Solomon Giwa-Amu said the incident could influence Nigerian policy in Darfur.

"It is unfortunate and tragic," he said. "We are investigating the incident. It is not totally unconnected with the failure of the mandate giving for the peacekeeping ... If the UN had come out stronger against the Sudanese government, we wouldn’t have lost as many soldiers at a time. We are not there for war."

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned the attack and called for the perpetrators to be held fully accountable for this outrageous act, describing it as "brutal and shocking".

This was the worst single attack that the 7,000-strong force had suffered in the region. Since 2004, the force has lost at least 25 men, with dozens of others injured, according to aid workers.
A 26,000-member hybrid UN-AU operation was authorised in July and is to be deployed early in 2008.

However, aid workers worry that the worsening situation in Darfur is making it increasingly difficult to adequately respond to the needs of the displaced. "We have a humanitarian problem that will not go away quickly," said John Distefano, ACT-Caritas Darfur emergency response operation director.

Among the worries are increasing clashes between and among armed groups representing differing tribal, ethnic and political groupings; banditry and ambushes and increased tensions in camps for the displaced.

According to the Church World Service, anxiety within the camps is heightened by long-standing fears of attacks and rape by militias; idleness and boredom; issues of civilian "protection" and when it might become safe for the displaced to return to their home villages.

More than 240,000 people have been newly displaced or re-displaced in Darfur during 2007, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, with thousands of people fleeing their homes each week.

[back to contents]

Uganda (ICC)

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents - Situation in Uganda

Ugandan rebel delegates plan first visit to Kampala
Reuters
by Skye Wheeler
October 2, 2007

JUBA, Sudan (Reuters) - Delegates from Uganda's rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) plan to meet government officials in Kampala this week, senior officials said on Tuesday, in a potential boost to the country's peace process.

The visit to the Ugandan capital would be the first by LRA representatives since the start of the group's two-decade insurgency that has killed tens of thousands of people.

"On Thursday the LRA delegation will travel to Kampala," said south Sudan President Salva Kiir in Juba.

"Even the Ugandans could not believe that these people can set foot there," he told a group of elder statesmen -- including South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter -- on a visit to Sudan to help mediate various issues.

Officials said the LRA leaders, wanted by an international war crimes court, would however remain in the bush.

Under peace talks taking place in neighbouring south Sudan, the government is next due to discuss with LRA delegates how to deal with crimes committed during the conflict.

More than a year of the stop-start talks in Juba, capital of south Sudan, has raised hopes of an end to one of Africa's longest running conflicts.

Despite mutual accusations of violence and repeated walkouts by the LRA, a truce signed in August 2006 has largely held, and Kiir said a peace deal could be struck in the coming months.

"By the end of the year we may find a ... solution to this conflict," he said.

INDICTMENTS

Kiir said such a deal may help solve the dilemma over International Criminal Court indictments against LRA chief Joseph Kony and three other commanders for crimes such as killing civilians and abducting children to use as fighters and sex slaves.

Many Ugandans want Kony and his henchmen to face local courts and traditional reconciliation rituals instead, but the ICC insists it will not drop the case.

Uganda's chief government negotiator and Internal Affairs Minister Ruhakana Rugunda confirmed the LRA delegation's visit.

"The LRA delegates were invited by the government of Uganda and when they come they will be guests of the state," he told Reuters.

But he declined to say whether the LRA delegation would meet President Yoweri Museveni.

The one-day trip to Kampala is part of the LRA delegation's week-long tour of Uganda to discuss how peace should be implemented, and to gather people from war-affected areas in the LRA assembly point on the Sudan-Congo border.

Rebel Victims Promised Compensation
Institute for War and Peace Reporting
By Samuel Okiror Egadu
October 4, 2007

Museveni says funds to come from government’s reconciliation and rehabilitation programme.

The Uganda government will compensate victims of the two-decade insurgency in northern Uganda once a comprehensive peace deal is reached at the South Sudan-mediated peace talks in Juba, President Yoweri Museveni announced this week.

Museveni said people who have been mutilated or raped, together with those whose relatives have been murdered by rebels of the Lord’s Resistance Army, LRA, in the region will be compensated under the government’s programme of reconciliation and rehabilitation.

The head of state is touring northern districts of Uganda devastated by both the war and the country’s worst floods in 35 years.

“We are going to mobilise funds,” Museveni told reporters in Gulu, the north’s biggest town, on October 1. “The victims will be compensated once a comprehensive peace agreement is signed in Juba.”

Meanwhile, government officials in Kampala, the Ugandan capital, announced that LRA negotiators would meet government negotiators in Kampala on October 4 in what could be a fillip to the Juba talks.

The visit to Kampala would be the first by LRA representatives since the northern war began in 1986. The government officials emphasised, however, that the visit would last only a day and that the movement’s top leaders would not be part of the delegation. They will remain in their bush headquarters in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC.

LRA spokesman in Juba Godfrey Ayoo said the chairman of the LRA delegation at the Juba talks, Martin Ojul, will lead a six-man team to Kampala.

LRA and government teams are currently engaged in on-off peace talks mediated by Dr Riek Machar, Vice President of the autonomous South Sudan government, and overseen by the United Nations special envoy for northern Uganda, former Mozambique president Joachim Chissano.

The talks in Juba, the South Sudan capital, are aimed at ending the 21-year insurgency that has displaced more than 1.7million people from their homes and resulted in more than 100,000 deaths. Some 75,000 people, including 38,000 children, have been abducted in LRA attacks.

Since negotiations began in July last year, with a ceasefire being agreed a month later, the war-ravaged region has been largely peaceful, and people have slowly begun returning to their homes from the squalid refugee camps.

Funding problems are currently stalling the Juba talks, which were adjourned on June 29. A date for their resumption keeps being set back, with mid-October now cited as the earliest possible date for a return to the table.

The rebels are requesting cash from international donors to carry out consultations with a wide range of northern representatives on accountability and reconciliation proposals that are on the table in Juba. The LRA argues that it needs the money to airlift 500 delegates from northern Uganda to the main rebel base in the 5,000 square kilometre Garamba National Park in the DRC. It also wants to fund travel for its negotiators to Argentina, South Africa and Sierra Leone to research issues of conflict, justice and reconciliation.

The government delegation has just concluded its own consultations in the north, collecting views from war victims and community leaders on issues of accountability and reconciliation, the third of five items on the agenda at the Juba talks.

Museveni, who told reporters that his government has devised a14-point programme for the reconstruction and rehabilitation of the north, said, "I am told the victims in this area are ready to forgive these people [the LRA rebels] who committed various atrocities against them. I was worried the people would take the law in their hands when they [the rebels] return home."

During its consultations on accountability and reconciliation, the majority of LRA victims said they would forgive the rebels in the interests of peace, according to government reports.

The LRA leader, Joseph Kony, his deputy, Vincent Otti, and top commanders Okot Odhiambo and Dominic Ogwen have been indicted by the Hague-based International Criminal Court, ICC, to answer charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. The LRA leaders face 33 charges of murder, rape, sexual enslavement, mutilation, abduction and recruitment of child soldiers as guerrilla fighters. A fifth indicted LRA commander, Raska Lukwiya, was killed last year in a battle with government forces near Kitgum, on the border with Sudan.

The president said he hoped the Kony would grasp the chance of peace offered by the Juba peace negotiations.

Describing the LRA as terrorists who were supported by Sudan’s Arab government until the Juba talks began, Museveni said, "I hope Kony and his group will use the chance of peace talks. Before the start of the talks, we had managed to eliminate terrorism caused by these rebels and brought peace. We fought and defeated the terrorists who were disturbing us and those Sudan Arabs who were supporting them.

“We have built an army that is able to guarantee peace in Uganda. No one will destabilise again our peace. We now have the means to guarantee the security in the whole country - quickly, unlike in the past.”

Museveni said the government intended reopening schools that were abandoned in northern Uganda as a result of the war.

Museveni said the 14-point recovery programme includes elimination of terrorism, construction of roads, restoring education, instituting micro-finance projects, an industrialisation strategy and reconstructing health facilities.

Victims want say in Uganda peace talks
ISN Security Watch (in Nairobi)
By Daniel Auma
October 8, 2007

While the victims of one of Africa's most brutal wars are now enjoying some quiet months of peace, they regret being left out of the process that will determine their future, and hope mixes with skepticism.

For the first time in 20 years, residents of restive, war-torn northern Uganda are experiencing a modicum of peace, and though several months of quiet have reigned, it will take some time to heal open wounds.

The peace talks are aimed at ending the conflict that has raged in northern Uganda since 1988 when the elusive Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) leader Joseph Kony took over leadership of a two-year old rebellion among northern Uganda's ethnic Acholi minority.

The LRA, formed in 1987, is a rebel guerilla army operating mainly in northern Uganda and parts of southern Sudan. The group is engaged in a rebellion against the Ugandan government in what is now one of Africa's longest-running conflicts. Kony proclaims himself a spirit medium and apparently wishes to establish a state based on the Ten Commandments and Acholi tradition.

The rebel group is accused of widespread human rights violations including mutilation, torture, rape and the abduction of civilians, the use of child soldiers and a number of massacres.

The peace talks were agreed to after Kony released a video in May 2006 in which he denied committing atrocities and seemed to call for an end to hostilities, in response to an announcement by President Yoweri Museveni that he would guarantee the safety of Kony if peace was agreed to by July.

A series of ongoing meetings have been held in Juba since July 2006 between the Ugandan government and the LRA. The talks, which resulted in a ceasefire in September 2006, have been described as the best chance for a negotiated settlement since the peace initiatives started in 1994.
Thousands of civilians have died in the war and nearly two million people have been displaced by the conflict and forced to live in squalid camps. The International Criminal Court (ICC) wants the LRA's top officials - among them Kony - to face charges including murder, rape and forcibly enlisting children.

A major achievement for the peace talks saw the rebels in southern Sudan pull back to a jungle hideout in Congo, removing serious security threats to millions of civilians in both northern Uganda and southern Sudan.

Victim voices

The UK-based charity Oxfam warns in a study released earlier this month that peace might not hold in Uganda if locals and other hundreds of thousands of other internally displaced victims are not made a part of the peace process.

The study, The Building Blocks for Sustainable Peace, is based on interviews with internally displaced persons (IDP) in camps in the Acholi region of northern Uganda.

The dilemma for the peace talks is that the 900,000 internally displaced victims of the insurgency want to own the peace process that would see their lives normalized. Oxfam warns that the LRA's failure to consult with the interested groups makes the potential outcome of the peace talks more vulnerable to collapse.

For Paul Okot, displaced from his home during the two-decade conflict and physically disabled, having lost his lips and earlobes to brutal insurgents, peace has little to do with official negotiations for a permanent ceasefire.

The 70-year-old, who spoke to an Oxfam research team, finds it much more difficult to forget the atrocities of the insurgency without the full participation of the locals in shaping its outcomes.

"I would like to give my opinion in the negotiations but I would not risk traveling to South Sudan. I really want the consultations to be near. Let them [the LRA] come here. We want them to come here. Why would I feel safe after what they have done to me?" Okot asked.

According to the report, the majority of northern Ugandans felt they were inadequately informed or consulted about the peace process and feared that the commitment of the negotiating parties might not hold long enough for the talks to meet a successful end.

Answering for atrocities

The peace talks are now in a state of deadlock, with the LRA demanding that Kampala promise to drop charges against the rebels at the International Criminal Court (ICC) to facilitate the negotiations.

According to the Oxfam study, many northern Ugandans doubt that a group as brutal as the LRA can herald peace in a region that has experienced so much atrocity committed by both sides of the conflict.

But LRA officials say that since the signing of the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement in Juba in August 2006, normalcy has returned to the restive region and incidences of abductions of young girls, for instance, have been greatly reduced.

Throughout the conflict, children by the thousands could be seen walking long distances in the middle of the night, running away from their IDP camps or homes in northern Uganda to seek safety in the bigger towns and cities, where they could more easily avoid abduction by the LRA.
"People stay out late into the night, the phenomenon of night commuting children is gone, transport and communication is picking up and business is steadily growing fast in Uganda and Southern Sudan," LRA spokesman Geoffrey Ayoo told ISN Security Watch in Nairobi.

"Even the Uganda People's Defense Forces [UPDF] soldiers who were deployed in the operation now have time to spend with their families. The Uganda peace talks in Juba have outlived the skeptics and enemies of peace. There will be no more war in our country because we want Uganda to develop," Ayoo said.

The Ugandan government and the rebels have promised to consult civilians affected by the conflict about justice and reconciliation settlements.

But the LRA's plan to airlift war victims into their jungle camp has been criticized by the Acholi traditional leader, Paramount Chief Rwot Achana, who says it will not lead to the meaningful consultation desired by victims.

Many of the affected communities interviewed by Oxfam said that justice without peace would serve no purpose; but they also felt that some form of justice was necessary though could not elaborate on exactly how justice could possibly be administered.

"There is little information getting through to the IDP population, which "reinforces the longstanding feeling of marginalization among much of the displaced population," the Oxfam study said.

Though more than half of those surveyed, 57 percent, said that security had improved since the start of peace talks in July 2006 and 60.5 percent were hopeful that conditions would improve further, most remain highly skeptical.

Responding to the Oxfam findings in Kampala this week, the Ugandan government assured victims of the insurgency that it was determined to find lasting peace so that those victims would return to their villages.

"For the population who have lived under the insurgency and in the camps for quite some time now, their skepticism and doubts are understandable," Internal Affairs Minister Ruhakana Rugunda told Ugandan media this week.

Balancing peace

Adam O'Brien, an analyst for the watchdog organization International Crisis Group (ICG), said the talks aimed at ending what has been termed one of Africa's most brutal wars have proceeded slowly, mostly due to mistrust between the parties, the ICC indictments and inadequate logistics.
"Addressing the LRA leaders' core security and livelihood concerns is key to peace, but direct engagement with their leaders, Joseph Kony and Vincent Otti, is needed," O'Brien told ISN Security Watch in Nairobi.

"The Juba peace process has matured in the last year and improved the lives of millions of civilians, both in northern Uganda and southern Sudan. But negotiating the remaining details and implementation requires more leverage, focus and discipline,” O'Brien said.

The analyst echoed the sentiments of the IDPs interviewed for the Oxfam report. "Many people feel they were left out of the peace process.[...]"

But, according to an source familiar with the talks, who answered questions posed by ISN Security Watch on the condition of anonymity, the people are involved.

"They are represented by their 'elders' and the representatives of civil society as well as their religious leaders," the source told ISN Security Watch. "The issue in my opinion is that their voice is included - as often as possible - in the process, but there it is not a good idea to overload the negotiation table with all sorts of vested interests."
Involvement of IDPs aside, the ICG warns in a September briefing that "the LRA is getting more from the process - food, money and security it can use to regroup and rebuild, and a chance to improve its image - than it is giving, and has reason to draw matters out."

"Many in the government and army are pursuing talks with less than full commitment. Museveni appears to want to increase the chance for an eventual military solution by showing that he has exhausted all peaceful options. Khartoum seeks to keep its old ally Kony in play as a proxy should Sudan’s shaky Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) falter," the ICG concludes.

Uganda: Owiny Lakaragic, northern Uganda - "you can't live with hatred"
United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs - Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN)
October, 8 2007

I have heard [LRA deputy leader Vincent] Otti on the radio saying he will not die alone, he will take us down with him. We don’t want to risk more war. So I’m begging the International Criminal Court to drop their case and let peace come to northern Uganda.

It’s good for the rebels to come back now.

Our family was affected by the war just as much as the next. The rebels beat my brother so badly with an axe to the head and [he almost] died, although he can’t hear any longer. It was a miracle. But he still forgives.

If we can forgive then it is good for us too, because you can’t live with hatred.

When the Devil does something wrong, God would forgive him. That’s why he gave us Jesus, his son, to remove our sins; we must forgive them.

In Acholiland we have Mato oput and that’s what we want to use for the rebels. It’s the traditional ceremony we use for reconciliation. The elders of the two clans come together, one admits wrong-doing and then drinks the juice of a tree’s bitter roots. We come together, eat together, we slaughter a sheep and drink local beer together.

I’ve seen it three times. We had a Mato oput in the camp when my brother-in-law killed my sister and now we stay together without any complaints. He met another woman and when she produced a daughter, she was named after my sister.

Then my grandfather did Mato oput after he killed a man by mistake while hunting animals.
You have to admit wrong-doing as part of the ceremony, but I think that [LRA leader Joseph] Kony and Otti will admit they did wrong and ask for forgiveness. That won’t be a problem. But if they don’t say it, there will be another war.

I wouldn’t mind living next to Kony or Otti. If they are forgiven, they are forgiven, but I think they will move to Kampala and join the army. They are army men, not made for village life.

The government also did terrible things. Back then perhaps Kony was fighting for us but for a long while Kony has been fighting for nobody but Kony.

There is an old expression, ‘when the elephants are fighting it’s the grass that suffers’. And that was happening here for a long time. But then at one point the government turned to the civilians up here and said we don’t want to kill you, we don’t have a fight with you, we only want to kill the enemies. And that’s when we started going to them for protection.

So I’d say to Kony, don’t make enemies any longer. Come back and let us work hand in hand. Leave the killing and let peace come to northern Uganda.

What do we need now? We need tools for return, tools to rebuild the country - spades for digging the latrines, tarpaulins for the roofs.

It’s good for the UN to give us the money and not the food – let us buy the food. But people need to work and that isn’t encouraged if they are given free food. If I had money I would buy cattle or tools. We need seeds now not food.

Our big problem here is the water. It is almost one and a half miles to the well. It was horribly dirty before I cleaned it out the day before yesterday. It’s clean now but it’s just too far away.

Then we have problems with health and education. We have seven villages in the parish. If they can’t build a health centre or school here in the village then they should build them in the next village. We need some in the parish, some facilities in the east and some in the west, but not to go all the way back to the camp.

Beginnings of "real peace"

I see the beginnings of real peace this time. Previously we had talks, but they were not serious. This will be different.

Some people said ‘don’t go back’. They were worried about the peace talks and said I’d die here, but I didn’t believe them.

I listen to the local radio Mega FM all the time and the BBC. And the news is good. If there is a problem we will know quickly and if they do fail then I can go back the next day and be in the camp well before the rebels.

But I didn’t want to go to one of these resettlement sites - they are just camps by another name. I’m not going to another camp - I refuse - enough of camps! I wanted to come back home to what’s mine, so that’s what I’ve done.

When I first came back all I could hear was the birds singing. So quiet, it was beautiful. I thought I was dreaming and started to cry.

I went to the place where I buried my father and prayed. And then I came back out here and started my job.

At first I hacked and burnt the bush. And I made charcoal to sell in the camp. With the money I bought a bicycle to take things to market and I paid for my eldest son’s wife.

Then I started to dig with my eldest boys.

Now we have built three huts here. They are just simple huts, but when I have the money and the grass is good I will build better ones - 10 or more - enough for all the family.

Next, I’m planning to buy an ox for ploughing. We used to have some oxen, but the Karamojong, the neighbouring pastoralists, came and stole them in 1996. I had 80 cows.

Today I’m digging here and planting the beans. In August we will be planting sim-sim [used to make oil] and groundnuts.

It’s very good to be eating the old Acholi food. It’s tasty and with the greens and groundnuts it makes you strong for the fields.

Why wait for four or five mugs of beans [of food aid]? I want to do my own thing.

Some [people] have become lazy and drunk in the camp. They start drinking at sunrise and they don’t finish until sunset. Unless they are returned by force, some of those lazy people will not go back to the village.

Yesterday I went to the camp to tell my brothers to come back and they agreed. They are just waiting for the grass.

I told my brothers not to waste time waiting for food like birds. A bird cannot dig, but we are not birds, we are men.

Events in 1994

I originally left here in 1994. We were suddenly woken by gunfire as the rebels came in the middle of the night. It was terrifying. They knocked down the door, dragged us out and beat us.

They beat me so badly that I Iost my teeth. Then they stabbed me with a knife in the top of my head. They showed no mercy and when they left they took two of my sons with them - Okuya, who was 13 at the time, and Okulu, who was just eight.

After they took the boys the government came and took us to the camp. I was happy to leave because after that we just wanted somewhere safe.

Until this day I don’t know what happened to them. Are they alive, are they dead, will they come and walk out of the bush? That’s the news that I wait to hear from Juba - what happened to my sons?

I was the last to leave the land and now I’m the first to come back. I’m proud of that.

Life in the camp

Life in the camp was very difficult. Firstly, we were hungry. Then it spoiled the children. Girls became prostitutes or started having sex when they were too young - just nine years old. But it was also bad for the boys. They would roam around at night and go dancing. HIV/AIDS is the camp’s curse. My fear was that my children would catch it, but thank God they haven’t. That’s why I left Acet as soon as I could.

I want to serve my children well as a father. I lost four of them in the camp to malaria and I thought ‘I have to get them out of here’.

I have 13 remaining children and most of them are still in the camp, where they are going to school. In time they will join us here too and start a new life.

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International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY)

Official Website of the ICTY

War Crimes Suspect Tolimir Says in Good Health
Javno
October 10, 2007

Tolimir is alleged to have helped Mladic plan and execute the massacre of 8,000 Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica in 1995.

Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect General Zdravko Tolimir has denied he is putting his life at risk by not taking medication, saying he is in good health.

"I am in excellent physical health, which can be confirmed by all other detainees and I suffer from no health problems whatsoever," he said in a statement issued on Wednesday by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

Tolimir, 59, a close aide of Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic, faces genocide and war crimes charges related to the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of 8,000 Bosnian Muslims.

Last week, the U.N. warcrimes tribunal in the Hague said Tolimir ran the risk of a stroke or heart attack by refusing medical treatment for high blood pressure.

He is suffering from an aneurism in his brain, as well as a serious heart condition, both of which are exacerbated by his high blood pressure. Tolimir said he stopped taking the medication after he was arrested on May 31 in Belgrade and handed over to the court. He has not given a reason for stopping the medication other than to say he does not feel he needs it anymore.

Tolimir is alleged to have helped Mladic plan and execute the massacre of 8,000 Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica in 1995, and is thought by military experts to have helped the commander evade arrest since.

Tolimir's arrest raised hopes that Mladic and his political boss Radovan Karadzic could be caught, but U.N. prosecutor Carla del Ponte has said that Serbia's progress in capturing suspected war criminals was too slow.

Frmr. State Security Officer Testifies in Haradinaj Trial
B92
October 11, 2007

THE HAGUE -- The trial of Haradinaj and two other ex-KLA leaders continued at the Hague Tribunal this week.

In his examination-in chief, Zoran Stijovic, the former chief of the analysis section in the Priština Security Service office, now a prosecution witness at the Hague, talked about the intelligence Serbian police (MUP) had on the involvement of Idriz Balaj in Kosovo crimes and his ties with the first accused Ramush Haradinaj.

In the cross-examination, the defense of the former KLA members mostly focused on alleged crimes committed by the Serbian police and its purported practice of transferring bodies away from the crime scenes.

Apparently, the defense teams of the three former KLA commanders do not believe that Stijovic’s evidence prejudiced their clients. In the cross examination, they focused on questions about the Serbian police, rather than the KLA.

When he answered the prosecutor’s questions, Stijovic claimed that the police had reliable intelligence on the involvement of Idriz Balaj in the crimes against Kosovo Serbs, Albanians and Roma and of the fact that he acted under Haradinaj’s control.

Ramush Haradinaj's defense did not pay much attention to this topic in the four hours it took to cross-examine Stijovic, choosing to focus on the transfer of bodies of the dead Albanian civilians killed in the NATO campaign of 1999, roughly a year after the crimes allegedly committed by their client, and the involvement of paramilitary groups in the Kosovo conflict at that time.

Stijovic answered that he was only partially informed of the activities of paramilitary and military units in the field as he was mostly working in his office. He was more forthcoming on the transfer of bodies from Kosovo to Serbia.

The information was based mainly on his "preliminary interview’"with Rade Markovic, former head of Security Service, in June 2001. Stijovic had already given evidence about this at the trial of Slobodan Miloševic.

Stijovic confirmed the authenticity of Markovic’s statement where he named Miloševic as the person who issued the order to transfer the bodies from Kosovo to Batajnica near Belgrade.

Vlajko Stojiljkovic, former minister of the interior, carried out the transfer, using police personnel, Markovic said in his statement. The defense has focused on this since the beginning of the trial in an attempt to prove it was possible that the Serbian police transferred bodies "not only in 1999, but also in 1998."

They claim the police threw bodies of Serbs, Albanians and Roma in the Radonjic lake canal "and then went on to blame the killings to the KLA."

The defense counsel devoted very little time to the effort to contest the reliability of the information gathered by the Serbian Security Service in Kosovo from statements it obtained from Albanians under arrest.

It showed two statements given by two such persons after their release to the activists of human rights organizations. The two say that they signed their statements "after being tortured in the police detention unit."

Stijovic allowed it was possible that the police officers in some situations did use force. This, he said, "happens in all police forces all over the world," adding that defendants often deny the statements they gave to the police once they appear in court.

The defense counsel of Idriz Balaj and Lahi Brahimaj also showed more interest in what the police did than in the KLA attacks against Serbian armed forces and Albanian and Serb civilians Stijovic was there to testified about.

A day earlier, Stijovic told the court there were several KLA strongholds, such as those in the villages of Prekaze, Jablanica and Glodane. They were run by Jashari, Brahimaj and Haradinaj families.

In early 1998, the Haradinaj clan, headed by Ramush Haradinaj, took over.

Last week, the witness described in detail the way in which the Serbian MUP obtained intelligence on KLA operations, to this week speak about the intelligence itself.

Before the spring of 1998, he says, the KLA operated in groups, attacking Serbian police patrols and the so-called collaborationists – local Albanians who were believed to be collaborating with the Serbian authorities.

The witness said that the "shoot and run" attacks had often been synchronized, indicating that the KLA groups were in contact with each other in this period.

In May 2007, the prosecution called former KLA spokesman Jakup Krasniqi and tendered into evidence a number of press releases in which the KLA assumed responsibility for the majority of attacks on the Serbian MUP officers in 1996 and 1997.

Krasniqi claimed that the press releases were "a conscious exaggeration" designed to "convince the Albanians about the strength and seriousness of the KLA." The journalists "misinterpreted" the contents.

Now, the prosecution used Stijovic’s testimony to prove that the claims in the KLA press releases were true. He confirmed that the intelligence the Priština State Security obtained almost always tallied with the KLA press releases, giving the example of the attack on the Serbian refugee settlement in the village of Babaloc in February 1996.

Before the armed rebellion started in earnest in early 1998, the main KLA strongholds were in the villages of Prekaze, Jablanica and Glodane, the witness said.

They were controlled by the Jashari, Brahimaj and Haradinaj families. In 1997, the KLA tried to set up a corridor in the Drenica area, leading to the Albanian border. Glodjane was one of the major strategic points on that axis.

This was a factor that contributed to the strengthening of the Haradinaj clan and to establishing Ramush Haradinaj as the first man in the KLA in that area.

After the beginning of 1998, and in particular after the battle of Glodane against the Serbian police was won on March 24, 1998, Ramush Haradinaj was the "alpha and omega" in the Pec area, Stijovic said.

226 Bodies Exhumed From Grave in Bosnia
Associated Press
By Aida Cerkez-Robinson
October 12, 2007

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — Forensic experts have exhumed the remains of 226 victims of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre from a mass grave in eastern Bosnia, officials said Thursday.

The mass grave, the third found in Zeleni Jadar, near Srebrenica, and one of dozens discovered in eastern Bosnia, contained only 34 complete bodies, while the rest were incomplete, said Murat Hurtic, the head of the forensic team.

This mass grave, like most of those found in the Srebrenica area, is filled with bodies moved from an original mass grave to try to cover up the crime, officials said. The perpetrators typically used bulldozers, which damaged the bodies. Experts sometimes find parts of the same body in different graves, making the task of identifying the victims more difficult. They have to reassemble the bodies using DNA analysis to return them to their families.

According to documents found among the remains, it was certain that they were Muslim civilians killed after Bosnian Serb troops overran the eastern town of Srebrenica in 1995, Hurtic said. The victims were killed with firearms and hand grenades, he said.

Next week, his team will open the fourth mass grave discovered in Zeleni Jadar.

The systematic execution of about 8,000 men was the worst massacre in Europe since World War II and is considered an act of genocide.

So far, nearly 3,000 Srebrenica victims have been found, identified and buried in the Potocari Memorial Center near Srebrenica.

Another 5,000 bags with remains of victims found in nearly 60 mass graves in eastern Bosnia are still waiting to be identified before being returned to their families.

Experts Discuss Future of ICTY and ICTR Archives
IWPR
By Merdijana Sadovic
October 12, 2007

Legal experts gathered in The Hague this week to discuss the future of the archives of both the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, ICTY, and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, ICTR.

The expert committee - chaired by former ICTY and ICTR prosecutor, Justice Richard Goldstone - is undertaking a study which should provide the two tribunals with an independent analysis of how best to ensure future accessibility of the archives.

They will also review different locations that may be appropriate for housing the tens of thousands of documents.

The experts will, among other things, discuss the establishment of a single joint archive, two separate archives or multiple archives and will recommend the best option.

“The work of the independent committee is crucial for the preservation of the legacy of the two tribunals and for the victims, as well as for the future for international criminal justice,” said Justice Goldstone, in a press release this week.

Both tribunals are due to complete their mission in the coming years and are working to put in place a clear system that will best serve the interests of people in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, as well as the international community.

Numerous important elements regarding the tribunals' immensely important archives will be assessed in this study, which will decide how their security, accessibility and preservation can be protected.

According to the committee’s statement, these archives contain a vast number of records. For example, the Office of the Prosecutor, OTP, possesses several million pages of evidence, and the Registries Court Management Support Sections hold tens of thousands of hours of videotaped courtroom proceedings.

“The tribunals’ archives are a unique and invaluable resource for the peoples of Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, the United Nations and the international community. The many benefits of and uses for the archives include their role to facilitate ongoing and future prosecutions, serve as a historic record, as well as contribute to peace and reconciliation in the regions,” read the statement.

The expert team is due to submit an interim report to the tribunals’ registrars during the first quarter of 2008. Before that, members of the team will be visiting all regions involved to consult governments and civil society on this issue and will also meet with relevant international NGOs.

This study is being undertaken by a team of internationally recognised experts in the archives and legal professions. The team dealing specifically with the ICTY archive is composed of Professor Dr Eric Ketelaar, a former national archivist of The Netherlands, and Cecile Aptel, a former staff member of both the ICTY and ICTR.

The ICTR-related team is made up of Professor Dr Saliou Mbaye, former national archivist of Senegal and Judge M Chande Othman, judge at the Tanzanian High Court, former prosecutor at the East Timor UN administration, and former chief prosecutor at the ICTR.

Serbia puts up €1m reward for the capture of General Mladic
The Independent
By Vesna Peric Zimonjic
October 13, 2007

Serbia has put up a reward of €1m (£700,000) for information leading to the arrest of the Bosnian Serb fugitive General Ratko Mladic.

Rasim Ljajic, who is in charge of Serbia's co-operation with the UN war crimes tribunal, said yesterday. "The decision on the award was made by the Council for National Security late last night."

An additional €1m will apparently be paid by the Serbian government for any information on Radovan Karadzic, the Bosnian-Serb former political leader who shares the indictment with Mladic for the genocide of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica in 1995. But Mr Ljajic repeated claims that Mr Karadzic is not hiding in Serbia, which is why the government has not officially offered money for his capture.

Serbia is to also pay rewards of €250,000 each for information that might lead to the arrests of the other two remaining war crimes suspects, Stojan Zupljanin and Goran Hadzic, Mr Ljajic said. "The offered rewards are a demonstration that Belgrade is serious about capturing the remaining war crimes fugitives," Mr Ljajic added.

General Mladic is widely believed to be hiding in Serbia, where his whereabouts can be accounted for until 2005; Mr Karadzic's whereabouts remain a secret, although there are indications he is hiding in the mountainous border region of eastern Bosnia and northern Montenegro.

The arrest of General Mladic remains the key condition for Serbian entry into the European Union, which will discuss progress on the issue at a foreign ministers' lunch on Monday. The rewards offer comes only days before the tribunal's chief prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, submits her latest evaluation report on Serbia's co-operation with the international war crimes court. A negative report might block the signing of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement by Serbia and the EU later this year.

The Serbian Council for National Security was established last year to co-ordinate the work of Serbian secret services in the search for war crimes suspects hiding in the country since the end of the Bosnian war in 1995.

Human Rights Watch called on EU foreign ministers this week to respect the high threshold of Serbia's extradition of Mladic as a condition for the agreement to be signed.

The war crimes issue remains the most controversial in Serbia, where opinion is still divided over the 1992-95 war. For many, General Mladic, the former commander of the Bosnian-Serb army, remains a hero who did nothing wrong. For his supporters, the war crimes tribunal represents a "conspiracy against the noble Serb nation".

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The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, War Crimes Chamber

Official Website

Custody terminated for Šefik Alic
Court of BiH
October 3, 2007

Today, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) rendered a decision terminating custody and imposing restrictive measures on Šefik Alic. The Accused was immediately released from custody in accordance with the Court’s decision.

Restrictive measures imposed on the Accused include the following:

• prohibition of attending social gatherings on the territories of Bužim and Bosanska Krupa Municipalities and

• prohibition of meeting with witnesses listed in the indictment.

Šefik Alic was held in custody since 2 November 2006. On 31 January 2007, the Court confirmed an indictment which charges Šefik Alic with War crimes against prisoners of war. The indictment alleges that during the armed conflict on the territory of BiH and the Republic of Croatia, in the capacity of the Assistant Commander of the Hamza Battalion for Security of the 5th Corps of the Army of BiH, Šefik Alic acted contrary to the provisions of the Geneva Conventions. According to the allegations in the indictment, the Accused, inter alia, participated in the physical and mental abuse of war prisoners, instigated their killings and failed to undertake measures to punish the perpetrators.

Indictment confirmed in the case of Sreten Lazarevic and Others
Court of BiH
October 8, 2007

On 5 October 2007, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) confirmed an indictment which charges Sreten Lazarevic, Dragan Stanojevic, Mile Markovic, and Slobodan Ostojic with War crimes against civilians.

The indictment alleges that, in the period between May 1992 and March 1993, as members of Army of the Serb Republic of BiH – Reserved police force of the Zvornik Police Department, the Accused acted contrary to the provisions of the Geneva Convention.

The indictment, inter alia, alleges that in June 1992, Sreten Lazarevic, in the capacity of deputy warden of the detention camp (located in the premises of the Magistrate Court and later at the DP Novi Izvor building) together with camp guards Mile Markovic and Slobodan Ostojic beat up four detainees as a result of which one of the detainees lost consciousness. The indictment alleges that in June 1992, Sreten Lazarevic handed over one detainee to the group of unidentified civilians who beat him up in the near by garage and than took him in an unknown direction and he still remains uncounted for. According to the indictment, on several occasions, Sreten Lazarevic permitted groups of Serb soldiers to enter detention centre where they physically and sexually harassed detainees.

According to the indictment on several occasions, Dragan Stanojevic, in the capacity of camp guard, enabled groups of Serb soldiers to torture and abuse detainees. The indictment alleges that in September 1992, Dragan Stanojevic beat up one ninety year old detainee.

Serbian War Criminal Predrag Kujundzic Arrested
Bosnia News
October 11, 2007

SARAJEVO, Bosnia (October 11,2007) – Acting on a warrant issued by the Bosnian State Prosecutor's Office, agents of the Bosnian State Investigation and Protection Agency (SIPA) arrested Serbian war criminal Predrag Kujundzic early yesterday morning.

According to a statement issued by the Bosnian State Prosecutor's Office, Serbian war criminal Predrag Kujundzic, born on 30 January 1961, was arrested in the Doboj area. He is charged of committing war crimes against Bosnian and Croatian civilians in 1992 and 1993,during the Serbian aggression against Bosnia.

Serbian war criminal was handed over to the competent prosecutor in the War Crimes Chamber of the Bosnian State Court, who will examine him and decide on an eventual motion for a custody order.

Serbian war criminal Predrag Kujundzic's name is associated with the "Predini vukovi" ("Predo's Wolves") ,a genocidal paramilitary formation of the Serbians living in Bosnia. In the past few years Serbian war criminal Predrag Kujundzic has been included in the list of suspected supporters of ICTY fugitive Serbian war criminal Radovan Karadzic. For that reason, he has been banned from entering EU countries and the US since 2003.

In 2000 the Cantonal Prosecution in Zenica received approval from the ICTY to file an indictment against Serbian war criminal Predrag Kujundzic.

The "Predini vukovi" group is also cited in the ICTY indictment against Serbian war criminal Slobodan Milosevic. In the indictment, this genocidal Serbian paramilitary group was associated with war crimes committed in the Bosnian city of Doboj during the 1992-1995 Serbian aggression against Bosnia.

Radic et al: Mother and Child in Vojno
Balkan Investigative Reporting Network
October 11, 2007

Protected witness R reveals some of her recollections of 80 days spent in Vojno detention camp. Protected prosecution witness "R" claims to have been detained for 80 days, together with her two-year son, in the village of Vojno, Mostar municipality. The Croatian Defence Council (HVO) turned the settlement into a detention camp for Bosniaks in 1993.

"Members of HVO Brigade from Bijelo polje came to our apartment on 13 September 1993. They took me, my mother, my toddler son and husband. We were taken to Vojno detention camp, together with one more family. Women stayed in a house, that had two rooms. Instead of glass, the windows were covered with wooden boards," the witness has said.

The Prosecution of BiH charges Marko Radic, known as Maka, Dragan Sunjic, known as Petarda, Damir Brekalo and Mirko Vracevic, as members of Bijelo Polje Brigade, with having participated in the "torture, mental and physical maltreatment, daily beating, unlawful capture and detention of Bosniaks".

Describing the conditions in Vojno detention camp, the witness has said that the detainees used to get three meals a day, but "the lunch consisted of pork, bread that was ten days old, and the supper was made of stinky fish that was not edible".

"The children did not get milk. On one occasion, before entering our room, Dragan Sunjic, Mirko Vracevic and deceased camp commander Marko Mihalj poured some milk and gave it to a cat and a dog who were in front of the house, while our children were looking at them," the witness has said.

During direct examination, the witness has said that she saw Marko Radic twice during her detention. The first time she saw him was "when she was invited to the headquarters," and the second time when the exchange was conducted on 2 December 1993.

The witness has said that Vracevic was a guard and she claims to have never seen Damir Brekalo. She has recalled that the detainees had to address Sunjic as "Mister Deputy Commander".

Protected witness R has also said that women performed forced labour. She has recalled that she once had to clean "the garage in which men were detained".

"When I entered I saw blood on the floor and walls, everything was covered with blood. I shall remember this all my life. It smelled so bad that I had to throw up immediately," the witness has said, adding that she did not see any detainees, because, as far as she knows, they all "performed forced labour" at the time.

The trial is due to continue on 29 October.

Mejakic et al: Detention in Accordance with Geneva Convention
Balkan Investigative Reporting Network
October 11, 2007

The Prosecution of BiH has presented an order issued by the Public Security Centre from Banja Luka, which also covered Prijedor, indicating that prisoners "should be treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention". Other documents have also been presented, by which the Prosecution is trying to prove allegations contained in the indictment - that there was a plan for taking over the control of Prijedor municipality.

The Prosecution of BiH charges Zeljko Mejakic, Momcilo Gruban, Dusan Fustar and Dusko Knezevic with having participated in rape, torture, murder and beating of Bosniaks and Croats detained in Omarska and Keraterm detention camps in the course of 1992.

Indictee Fustar's defence attorney Dragan Ivetic has objected to the inclusion of the Public Security Centre's order dated August 1992, because "it does not concern the inductees and it is irrelevant".

"The Prosecution of BiH considers this document relevant, because the question of what led to the issuance of such an order is a legitimate question," Prosecutor Peter Kidd has explained. The Trial Chamber has admitted the document after hearing his explanation.

The Prosecution of BiH has also presented four lists containing names of 97 persons who "should be apprehended to the collection centre in Omarska" dated June and July 1992. It has also presented a list of reserve policemen of the Public Security Centre in Prijedor who were "engaged in Omarska and Keraterm".

The 37 pieces of material evidence presented, on 11 October, by the Prosecution of BiH also include a letter signed by Simo Drljaca, dated October 1995, concerning assignment of a rank to Zeljko Mejakic.

"The letter indicates that Mejakic performed the functions of wartime police station commander in Omarska from April 1992 to July 1993," Kidd has said. Attorney Ivetic has pointed out that the document contains "incorrect information" and that its "authenticity is questionable".

"Mejakic says that he saw this document for the first time when he was in The Hague. He also says it contains incorrect information. The authenticity of the document is questionable and I hope the Prosecution of BiH does not think that each document obtained from The Hague is correct," Ivetic has said.

The indictment alleges that, from 24 May to 30 August 1992, Mejakic was commander of Omarska detention camp, in which around 3,000 Bosniaks and Croats were detained.

According to the indictment filed in The Hague, Drljaca was a member of the Emergency Headquarters in Prijedor and Chief of the Public Security Centre in Banja Luka from 30 April to 31 December 1992. In July 1997, he was killed in the course of an arrest operation conducted by SFOR as per an order issued by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

The Prosecution of BiH has also presented a solemn oath of police officers signed by Gruban in May 1992, Guidelines on Organization and Activities of Serbs in Extraordinary Circumstances dated December 1991, Decision on Attachment of the Autonomous Region of Bosanska Krajina, Decision on Strategic Objectives of the Serbian Population in BiH dated May 1992, etc.

The Prosecution of BiH charges Momcilo Gruban, also known as Ckalja, with having been one of the guard commanders in Omarska detention camp from 24 May to 30 August 1992.

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