Statement of Ms. Mary Balikungeri
Rwanda Women’s Network (for Economic Justice)

Numerous countries are struggling to come to terms with the past in the wake of communal violence, genocide or prolonged civil war. How postwar societies understand the past, assign responsibility, and struggle to reconstruct divided communities is an exceedingly complex process about which there are many opinions, but little understanding. Over the past decade, the international community has played a major role in this process through humanitarian interventions aimed at alleviating the suffering of vulnerable populations, through peace agreements brokered by the United Nations and other third parties, and through the establishment of international tribunals to investigate and prosecute war criminals.

In the past 15 years or so, individual governments and to a lesser extent, the United Nations have established Truth Commissions in many countries to collect testimonies for victims of human rights abuses and from perpetrators themselves. The commissions believe that if the truth about the past becomes known, a people made sick by terror and lies can begin to heal. The Commissions also seek to explain the genesis of repressive regimes and apportion moral responsibility for their deeds. The hope is that a full accounting of past crimes would open the way for reconciliation.

In May 1993, the UN Security Council created an International Tribunal in the Hague -- a the first since the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials – to investigate and prosecute war crimes in the former Yugoslavia. After a Hutu-led slaughter claimed the lives of nearly a million Rwandans in 1994, the Security Council set up a second tribunal in Arusha, Tanzania to prosecute those responsible for acts of genocide and crimes against humanity in Rwanda. Building on this momentum, representatives of over 100 governments met in Rome in June last year to consider a Treaty which could eventually create a permanent International Criminal Court. All these initiatives come as a hope to the people of the world struggling to come to terms with their past. The challenge though is: “what do war crimes trials accomplish?”; “to what extent do these international initiatives respond to the needs of the victims?”; and “Can the response be meaningful without rehabilitating the lives and responding to the basic needs of the survivors?”

Besides the obvious goals of trials to uncover the truth, trials individualize guilt and separate criminals from the nations. This is a typical case of Rwanda where the ordinary citizen cannot understand why the ICTR is not established in Rwanda. The International Community has chosen to use trials to promote justice and accountability in post-war societies, yet the question of whose needs are being met by these legal proceedings has never been fully addressed. Do trials respond to the desires and expectations of those who have survived the devastation and terror of war? or do they merely assuage the guilt of the world community for having failed to intervene to prevent genocide or wars for that matter?

In my country (Rwanda) many communities are unaware of the work of the ICTR or they are distrustful of their motives and utility. If communities fail to accept or integrate the findings of these tribunals into their collective memory, then the International Community is supporting a process that remains distant and perhaps irrelevant to the lives of those most affected by genocide and communal violence. Clearly there is a big gap between how the International Community responds to genocide with legal processes and how survivors respond with their own strategies born out of the need to rebuild their lives and communities. In my opinion, if the tribunals can be made more relevant to the survivors through their grassroots institutions, then it may be possible over time to achieve both justice and reconciliation.

Importance of Victim’s Participation:

The Preparatory Committee of the International Criminal Court is in the midst of drafting operative instruments needed to implement the Rome Statute – “The Rules of Evidence and Procedure” which will eventually develop a framework that will give effect to the mandates around victims/witness participation and measures towards their protection.

Based on my experience of work with survivors, the interest of justice and the interest of victims are complimentary. I explain – the victim’s interest in seeing crimes effectively investigated is that of seeing justice done.

The Rules should therefore,
(1) ensure that justice and its mechanisms should engage public awareness education in order to bring the process closer to the people through their grassroots organizations and,
(2) Provide a mechanism to institutional/social rehabilitation support to the organizations working with survivors.

The Rules should ensure the rights of victims, such as the rights to privacy, security, truth, justice, reparation and compensation.

Protective & Reparations Measures:

Reparations play a major role in a healing process towards victims, the entire society including perpetrators themselves. This process plays a role in preventing future violations.

Protective measures lie in the responsibility of the Court. The Court should therefore, take all reasonable steps to protect those who assist it as witnesses. The Court should have all the power to take such measures as prove necessary, whether before, during or after trial. Such measures must be consistent with the right of the accused as provided for in the Statute.

Rules that are protective to victims should be flexible to respond to the interest of victims. It is essential that the Court treat victims with compassion and sensitivity.

Rules and Roles of the Victims and Witness Unit:

These should clearly be spelled out. A specific mandate to “provide, in consultation with the prosecutor, protective measures and security arrangements is critical.”

Rules should indicate the scope of the services to be facilitated by Witness Protection Unit. Those rules should include rehabilitation through the achievement of justice.

Conclusion: