Human Rights in Ireland

The old adage that a week is a long time in politics is one that is readily accepted in liberal polities, though it reflects more the rapid changes of personal power due to scandals and party shifts than the glacial progress of modern politics. It may explain the rather exaggerated expectations of what can be achieved in the space of a year in societies with a far weaker state apparatus. Yesterday marked the one year anniversary of the beginning of the Egyptian revolution and has attracted tens of thousands of people gathered in Tahrir Square to mark the event that led to the toppling of former President Hosni Mubarak. Despite a significant decrease in the quantity of human rights abuses and the very significant fact that last week Egypt inaugurated its newly elected parliament in which Islamists of various colours took 73% of the vote, the progress is Egypt has been treated with a large degree of scepticism among the western media media and NGOs. The primary reason for this is of course the apparent endurance of repressive rule by the army which has continued some of the practices of the prior regime. Read Full Post »

Balthazar Garzon, the Spanish judge who served on Spain’s central criminal court and the  Juzgado Central de Instrucción No. 5, which investigates the most important criminal cases in Spain, including terrorism, organised crime and money laundering, yesterday went on trial over accusations that he had abused his powers to investigate atrocities committed during the Spanish Civil War. (For a brief bio of Garzon, see here, for coverage of the case see here, here and here). Garzon will be familiar to many for his role in ordering the extradition of Chile’s former dictator Augusto Pinochet from Britain to face charges of human rights abuses. He has also pursued members of the former dictatorship in Argentina, indicted Osama bin Laden and probed abuses at the US prison for terrorism suspects at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. Domestically, he spearheaded Spain’s fight against political corruption and against terrorism by ETA. Read Full Post »

Developments in recent weeks once more highlight the under-appreciated complexity of the relationship between human rights organisations, democratising regimes and processes of international accountability. On Monday last, Egyptian civil rights lawyers demanded the death penalty for former President Hosni Mubarak on Monday, joining prosecutor’s calls for him to be executed. On the other hand, a coalitions of international NGOs (the Open Society Justice Initiative, International Commission of Jurists, Lawyers without Borders, Canada, the International Center for Transitional Justice) attempted to stimulate a reluctant Haitian government in Port-au-Prince to prosecute its former dictator, Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier for crimes against humanity through an amicus curiae brief to the national prosecutor laying out the basis for prosecution under international law, arguing that the case is not covered by a local statute of limitations. Read Full Post »

One of the most cutting criticisms of the International Criminal Court is that of imperialism, best captured in the cries that it is “A European Court for Africans.” This reproach is not always disinterested of course – the revival of anti-colonial language at the time of the Bashir indictment would have been more convincing was it not accompanied by Sudanese stonewalling over the Darfur atrocities. However, the Court makes the argument for globalised justice for itself when it attempts to dictate the course of bona fide national processes of criminal accountability. The prime example is its statement on the arrest of Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi, against whom warrants of arrest were issued by the Court in connection with the Libya situation by the President of the Assembly of States Parties to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, Ambassador Christian Wenaweser. He began in an unobjectionable manner, stating that “by arresting Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi the Libyan authorities have taken a major step towards ensuring accountability and due process rights and towards fulfilling their obligations under international law”, before commending Libyan authorities for their cooperation with the Court to date. He reminded his audience that under the Rome Statute, Libya retained primary jurisdiction over all crimes committed on its territory, but went on to say that “it must be ensured that Saif Al-Islam is tried in a court of law and in accordance with international standards. Should the Libyan authorities wish to try him in Libya, they can make the case before the Court that their national judicial system is willing and able to do so in an independent and impartial manner”. Philippe Sands in today’s Guardian argues that the new Libyan government is “bound by a legal framework: it cannot lawfully ignore the ICC judges and decide that Saif will be tried under local law. Unlike Iraq, where there was no international indictment of Saddam, the decision on Saif is not an exclusively Libyan affair. Read Full Post »

Perhaps surprisingly given that fact that issues of transitional justice have been central to UN peacebuilding doctrine since 2004’s Rule of Law and Transitional Justice Report (some might go as far as to say it was mainstreamed in 1997’s later updated set of principles for the protection and promotion of human rights through action to combat impunity) , it is only in the last few weeks that the Human Rights Council adopted a long-mooted resolution to appoint, for a period of three years, a new Special Rapporteur on promotion of truth, justice, reparation, and guarantees of non-recurrence of serious crimes and gross violations of human rights. The Special Rapporteur’s mandate will include gathering relevant information on national situations, practices, and experiences, as well as normative frameworks, related to transitional justice mechanisms.  The Special Rapporteur will be tasked with providing technical assistance upon request, exchanging and promoting good practices, and recommending strategies to address grave human rights abuses and serious crimes.  The resolution received wide support, as it was co-sponsored by more than 75 countries.  The Council requested the Special Rapporteur report annually to the Human Rights Council and the General Assembly.  The move has been warmly welcomed by the INGO community such as the Center for Justice and International Law and the International Center for Transitional Justice .

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Last week’s overthrow of the Libyan regime makes more likely the trial of Muammar El-Gaddafi, his son Saif al-Islam and intelligence chief Abdullah al-Sanussi for crimes committed against demonstrators in the early days of the Libyan uprising. The UN Security Council referred the case to the ICC under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. At the time, the referral was made under circumstances in which it was impossible to expect alleged crimes against humanity to be adequately investigated in Libya. In one of the many paradoxes that riddles the court, the actual overthrow of the Government makes trial at the Hague more tenable in practical terms but may make it less so politically. The new regime may be keen to try the dictator for a number of understandable reasons –retribution, symbolism, self-legitimisation – in addition to the very salient but oft-ignored fact that they have the sovereign right and responsibility to do so. The drumbeats for the ICC have begun, most notably a piece  by former Special Court for Sierra Leone judge, Geoffrey Robertson in today’s Guardian, taking issue with British government policy that  the fate of the Gaddafis should be a matter for the Libyan people. Read Full Post »

We are familiar, post-Watergate, with the old adage that “It’s not the crime, it’s the cover-up.” As trials proceed in Tunisia and Egypt after the fall of their anciens regimes, the phrase might be Bowdlerized to “its not the human rights violations, it’s the embezzlement” given the eye-brow raising charge sheets. While Ben Ali and Mubarak presided over authoritarian security states noted for torture and illegal detention, it is notable that their indictments are for the considerably lesser crimes of corruption and giving orders to kill protesters. Mubarak’s trial for corruption and killing protestors constitutes merely the tip of a very large iceberg of criminality. Mubarak (23) and his sons, Gamal and Alaa, appeared in an Egyptian court to face charges, Ben Ali and his wife, Leila Trabelsi, have refused to return from exile in Saudi Arabia. 23 relatives and collaborators of Tunisia’s ousted president are on trial for illegally possessing foreign currency, jewelry trafficking and attempting to flee the country. They face from six months to five years in prison, if convicted. Ben Ali and his wife were tried in absentia recently for his suspected involvement in some of the country’s largest businesses during his 23-year long reign. On 20 June, the couple were sentenced to 35 years in prison after being found guilty of theft and unlawful possession of cash and jewelry.  Read Full Post »

In the aftermath of the Ferns, Ryan and Murphy Reports, the 400-page Commission of Investigation Report into the Catholic Diocese of Cloyne into the handling of clerical child sex abuse in the primarily Co Cork Catholic diocese was published today. The period covered by the Cloyne investigation was from 1 January, 1996 (date of the introduction of the Irish Catholic Church’s first guidelines on child protection) to 1 February  2009. The resulting report (in PDF form here) contains 26 chapters and includes findings on all 19 priests who faced abuse allegations there over the period investigated. It examines the manner in which allegations of clerical sex abuse were handled by the diocese and Church authorities, as well as by An Garda Síochána and health services. On Friday of last week the president of the High Court Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns decided that parts of chapter nine are not to be published for now because of pending criminal proceedings against one priest.
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Exile, meaning to be away from one’s home state while either being explicitly refused permission to return and/or being threatened with imprisonment or death upon return, has become in vogue once more for heads of state. The departure of Tunisian President for exile in the Saudi city of Jeddah (the same city where former President Idi Amin of Uganda lived in exile until his death on 2003 after being removed from power on 1979 at end of the Ugandan-Tanzanian War) in February has been followed by the departure of Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh to the same country, ostensibly for medical treatment following a rocket attack on his presidential palace on Friday, but which many speculate may become permanent. Though the government rejected an opposition proposal to prepare for the transition from the rule of President Ali Abdullah Saleh and for the election of his replacement and though his spokesmen said no decisions on Yemen’s future could be taken until he returned from Saudi Arabia, the US and EU have pressured Sana’a to initiate what US secretary of state Hillary Clinton called an “immediate transition” to a new regime.  Saleh’s departure, if it becomes permanent, will inevitably have an impact on any process of accountability for crimes committed during the recent spike in repression – Saudi Arabia has not signed the Rome Statute.

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Inevitably given the level of briefing, leaking and PR emanating from the ICC Prosecutor’s office in the past fortnight, Colonel Gaddafi and his intelligence chief, Abdullah Senussi, have been indicted as suspects for crimes against humanity by Luis Moreno-Ocampo today. Less expectedly, the former’s son, Saif, has also been named. ICC judges must still decide whether or not to issue warrants for their arrest. Moreno-Ocampo said: “The evidence shows that Muammar Gaddafi personally ordered attacks on unarmed Libyan civilians. His forces attacked Libyan civilians in their homes and in the public space, shot demonstrators with live ammunition, used heavy weaponry against participants in funeral processions and placed snipers to kill those leaving mosques after the prayers.” Moreno-Ocampo made it clear that if the ICC approves his request for the three arrest warrants, he will not be asking NATO to enforce them. NATO is of course in no place to enforce the warrants, given that it appears no nearer to effecting regime change than it was a month ago. There is increasing evidence that the alliance has ran out of ideas on how to wage the campaign. Gen. David Richards, head of Britain’s armed forces, announced yesterday that he was concerned that the situation would reach a stalemate without increased NATO strikes. Read Full Post »