Jury still out on international war crimes system

(Reuters) – Former Liberian President Charles Taylor’s war crimes conviction may be seen in some

quarters as a victory for global justice, but a backlash against costly, lengthy international tribunals is also

underway.

Found guilty of aiding and abetting a host of crimes including murder, rape

and torture as well as arming brutal Sierra Leonean rebels, Taylor became the first head of state to be convicted by an

international tribunal since the Nuremberg Trials after World War Two. He will be sentenced on May 30.

While Adolf

Hitler avoided justice at Nuremberg by committing suicide in his Berlin bunker, his successor Admiral Karl Doenitz was

convicted of crimes against the laws of war and planning a war of aggression.

Human rights groups and western

governments in particular welcomed the Taylor verdict, saying it stood as a warning to others that while the wheels of

justice might take a long time to turn, the age of impunity for national leaders was over.

But with the United

Nations-backed “hybrid” court trial – including both international and Sierra Leonean members – taking a decade and costing

an estimated $50 million, some see that as simplistic. Some put the cost of the entire Sierra Leone tribunal process at some

$200 million, while British newspapers complained that plans for Taylor to serve his sentence in a British prison could cost

taxpayers up to 100,000 pounds a year.

At the very least, some wonder whether the money could have been better spent

in impoverished West Africa.

While Taylor’s prosecution was handled by a tribunal only looking at one conflict –

Sierra Leone, not the Liberian civil war in which he is also accused of mass atrocities – most more recent war crimes cases

are in the hands of the International Criminal Court.

That has now issued indictments for crimes committed in six

countries – Democratic Republic of Congo,

Uganda, Sudan, Central African Republic, Libya and Kenya – and found itself coming under growing criticism itself.

“No

one’s in favor of impunity,” says Jennifer Cooke, head of the Africa program at the Centre for Strategic and International

Studies in Washington DC. “But there are growing questions about the way in which international justice is being carried out

in cases like this. There’s the cost, there is the time and with the ICC there are complaints that they are only targeting

Africans.”

Others say that while the system remains deeply imperfect, and does almost invariably find itself targeting

less powerful countries and their leaders, it is improving.

The fact that some of the first recent war crimes trials

were for abuses in the former Yugoslavia, they say, suggest African complaints of victimization may be wide of the mark. That

prosecution remains a distant dream in many conflicts, they say, does not make the process a bad thing.

“There is no

doubt…(the) verdict sends an important message to high-ranking state officials; no matter who you are or what position you

hold, you will be brought to justice for crimes,” said Brima Abdulai Sheriff, Director of Amnesty International Sierra

Leone.

Other voices, however, worry that on occasion war crimes charges themselves may be making it harder, not easier

to bring peace. Indicted war criminals such as Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army leader Joseph Kony might become more reluctant

to agree peace deals.

Less punitive systems such as South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, where abusers

were granted amnesty if they told the truth, are held up as alternative models. But other recent attempts, such as Sri

Lanka’s recent inquiry after its civil war, have been widely criticized as whitewashing government acts.

“Prosecution

is very important,” says Colette Rausch, director of the rule of law program at the United States Institute for Peace. “(But)

it’s not the only thing when you look at it from a transitional justice perspective — looking at the transition from

conflict to peace. It doesn’t necessarily heal all wounds and it doesn’t necessarily help individual

victims.”

JUSTICE DELAYED, DENIED?

The failure to hold other heads of state accountable, experts say, reveals

some more of the struggles international justice faces.

The trial of Slobodan Milosevic, the Yugoslav leader accused

of orchestrating multiple atrocities during the Bosnia and Kosovo wars, died in 2006 with his trial unconcluded. Critics said

he had been simply allowed to prolong his trial too long, effectively denying justice to his victims.

Sudan’s

President Omar Al Bashir, indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity in 2009 and for genocide the following year,

remains not just at large but still in power.

The charges hanging over his head do not appear to have significantly

weakened him domestically or perhaps even within Africa. The African Union and Arab League both condemned the indictment, and

he has since visited several countries including Djibouti, Egypt and Kenya — a move some worry has essentially made a

mockery of the court.

When Muammar Gaddafi was killed by a mob last year in the dying days of Libya’s civil war, some

western states and local leaders, many sometime allies or co-conspirators, while condemning the act may have drawn a sigh of

relief he would not appear in court.

Gaddafi might have jumped at the chance to extend his time in court as long as

possible and seek to compromise Western governments with accusations of co-operation.

Certainly, Libya shows little

sign of handing over Gaddafi’s eldest son Saif, captured in November and in custody. After discussions between the ICC and

Libyan authorities, he may now be tried in Libya but under ICC supervision.

That, analysts suggest, would allow

Libya’s new rulers much tighter control over proceedings and to try him on counts other than war crimes — potentially

including financial embezzlement.

Some rights activists have long worried he might put up a relatively strong defense

against the war crimes charge if he were able to claim he had no direct involvement or was trying to rein in his father’s

excesses.

MOST POWERFUL WALK FREE?

The only head of state so far extradited to the International Criminal

remains Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo, sent to the Hague in November. He was captured in his compound in Abidjan following

an operation by French and Ivorian forces loyal to Alassane Ouattara, internationally recognized as the winner of a 2010

election.

But there seems little sign that either Ivorian courts or the ICC itself have any particular appetite to

charge those on the winning side with war crimes, despite reports from groups such as Human Rights Watch laying serious

accusations on both.

In the other countries so far handled by the ICC, some again see a reluctance to charge those

still in authority. While Lord’s Resistance Army leader Joseph Kony is widely regarded by rights groups as one of the

world’s worst war criminals, accused of killings, rapes, murders and child soldier recruitment, Uganda’s President Yoweri

Museveni is also seen far from clean.

Once lauded by the West, critics now view his rule as increasingly

autocratic.

In Democratic Republic of Congo, several militia leaders have been indicted of various crimes. But there

have been a few suggestions of a move against President Joseph Kabila despite allegations of abuses by his

forces.

Syria’s Bashar Al Assad, analysts suspect, will probably avoid his own ICC indictment as long as Russia and

China protect him from a Security Council

ruling referring him to the court. Beijing, Moscow and Washington will likely long drag their feet on any new structures that

could hold their officials or commanders responsible for acts committed at home or abroad.

But some believe that the

Taylor verdict suggests the overall tide of history may now be unstoppable.

“It’s hard to say where things will go

from here,” said Rausch at the United States Institute for Peace. “But given what has happened with the ICC – which some

people said would always be impossible to set up – I think the systems will continue to grow. Exactly what they will look

like, it’s impossible to say.”

(Reporting By Peter Apps)