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28 June 2017 - NPWJ News Digest on international criminal justice
Articles
In First, ICC Judges Visit Auschwitz-Birkenau
By The Jerusalem Post, 27 Jun 2017
The International Criminal Court announced on Monday that for the first time, its judges went as a group to visit Auschwitz-Birkenau. The judges “paid their respect to the victims of the concentration camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau, which serves as a somber reminder of the importance of the court’s mandate to fight impunity for the perpetrators of such atrocities” in a Saturday visit, a statement from the ICC said. The visit took place at the end of a seminar and retreat held Thursday through Saturday in Krakow, aimed at improving ICC appeals proceedings.
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Netherlands Partly Liable for 1995 Massacre of Bosnian Muslim Men, Court Rules
By The New York Times, 27 Jun 2017
A Dutch court ruled on Tuesday that the government was partly liable for the deaths of about 350 Muslim men in 1995 in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, the site of Europe’s worst mass murder since World War II. The court largely upheld a landmark 2014 judgment that found the Netherlands liable in the deaths of the men, who were turned over to Bosnian Serb forces by Dutch peacekeepers operating under the command of the United Nations, and then killed. But unlike that judgment, the new ruling limits the Dutch government’s liability to 30 percent of the damages, based on its assessment that the victims would have had a 70 percent chance of being killed even if Dutch peacekeepers had not wrongfully ordered them, on July 13, 1995, to leave a United Nations compound after the area was overrun by Bosnian Serb paramilitary forces.
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Saif Gaddafi’s Release and the Challenge for International Criminal Justice
By Just Security, 27 Jun 2017
Six years after his capture during the Arab Spring uprising against his father Muammar Gaddafi, and despite pending charges in the International Criminal Court, Saif al Islam Gaddafi has been set free by his captors, a western-Libyan militia known as the Abu Bakir Siddiq Brigade. Although he had no official position in the administration of his dictator father, Saif Gaddafi was influential and expected to succeed his father as Libya’s leader. Whether he will mount a campaign to return to power is yet to be seen, but his newfound freedom is sure to make his political opponents anxious. His release also poses a challenge to the United Nations and the International Criminal Court (ICC), which have sought his extradition to face ICC charges, and undermines the potential of the international criminal justice system to help bring peace to the country.
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DR Congo: UN Experts to Investigate Kasai Region Violence
By Human Rights Watch, 23 Jun 2017
The United Nations Human Rights Council adopted by consensus a resolution on June 23, 2017, directing the UN high commissioner for human rights to send a team of international experts to investigate alleged human rights violations and abuses in the central Kasai region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The Congolese government has agreed to cooperate, including by facilitating access. The final resolution incorporates language from proposals prepared by the African and European groups at the Council.
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