Justice for Charles Taylor

Can this war-crimes court finally get it right?

from the July 5, 2007 edition

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In 2002, when the UN was figuring out how to deal with the aftermath of the many atrocities committed during Sierra Leone's civil war, they tried to correct flaws that had become evident during the work of Africa's oldest war-crimes court, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). Serious criticisms of the ICTR have been expressed – by myself and others – on five main grounds. Despite the excellent motives of ICTR's founders and officials, it has been selective in its choice of cases. It has been disconnected, both geographically and conceptually, from the primary stakeholders whom it seeks to serve, inside Rwanda. It has been very expensive, gobbling up international aid dollars. It has been largely unaccountable, either to the survivors of the Rwandan genocide or to anyone else. And it has strongly polarized Rwandan politics.

So in Sierra Leone, the UN located its new war-crimes court inside the country, and, by making it a "joint" court with the national justice system, they tried to maximize the good effects it would have on that system. Also, alongside the court, the UN established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, that could – like its earlier model in South Africa – help build national reconciliation while getting the truth out about earlier atrocities. (The Sierra Leonean TRC finished its work in 2004, leaving a mixed record of achievement.)

When it moved the Taylor trial to The Hague, the SCSL replayed some of the disturbing features of the ICTR. Today, we still don't know how this trial will play out for the SCSL and for Sierra Leone's hard-pressed people.

It is good that Taylor's capacity to cause them further harm has, for now, been severely curtailed. But there are other ways that outcome can be achieved. For example, peace negotiators in northern Uganda are seeking to reintegrate their worst local warlord, Joseph Kony, back into normal society, much as Abraham Lincoln did with the US's Southern rebels after the civil war. (That approach has worked well in other places, including Mozambique and South Africa.) Also, unless the Sierra Leoneans can build a sustainably peaceful order, other warlords will emerge there in the future.

Events in the well-funded Hague courtroom may all seem very distant from the concerns of the Sierra Leoneans, who are still reeling from the impoverishment, mass killings, and dislocations inflicted on them.

• Helena Cobban is a Friend in Washington for the Friends Committee on National Legislation. The views expressed here are her own.

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