ICTJ in the News

May 25, 2005

The righteous sword of the law (part I)

Radio Netherlands

By Chris Tenove

"These were the leaders after 1996, commanding an army of evil, a corps of destroyers, and a brigade of executioners bent on the criminal takeover of Sierra Leone -- Ruin was their motto and destruction as their creed."
David Crane, Prosecutor for the Special Court for Sierra Leone

When David Crane addresses the Special Court for Sierra Leone he sounds like an actor in a 1950s courtroom drama. In a steely, measured voice he makes indignant accusations and describes - in great detail - scenes of horrific violence. Since June of 2004, Crane and his witnesses have presented chilling evidence of amputations, the indoctrination of child soldiers, and even cannibalism.

These crimes took place during a ruinous civil war in Sierra Leone that lasted throughout the 1990s. It is estimated that 70,000 people were killed, and a third of all Sierra Leoneans were displaced from their homes.

At first, even United Nations troops failed to stop the bloodshed - 500 peacekeepers were captured by rebels and imprisoned in their jungle stronghold. But over time the 17,000-member UN mission, together with support from British armed forces, gradually put an end to the fighting.

By 2002, the country was secure enough to hold national elections. That same year, David Crane arrived in the capital Freetown and began gathering evidence for war crime trials.

Chief Prosecutor Crane is an example of a new pattern: when peacekeepers arrive, lawyers are often close behind. Today there are trials underway for Sierra Leone and Rwanda, and war crime investigators on the ground in Sudan, Uganda, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The spaceship phenomenon

But we can't assume that victims in these countries will immediately appreciate international tribunals. Marieke Wierda, a senior associate at the International Centre for Transitional Justice, says that these war crime trials can seem unconnected to the traditions and concerns of local people.

The worry in Sierra Leone, she says, is that the Special Court will ultimately resemble a spaceship: it will descend upon Freetown, go about its mysterious business, and then blast off again, leaving nothing behind.

"That is the worry of the spaceship phenomenon," Wierda says, "that [the Court] is a self-contained unit that carries out all its activities but never really becomes comprehensible or relevant to the man in the street in Sierra Leone."

A day at court

So what does the Special Court look like through the eyes of Sierra Leoneans? To find out, I invited three residents of Freetown to attend a pivotal day of trials. On March 7th, David Crane launched the prosecution of three members of the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council. The AFRC is one of three armed factions that are being tried at the Special Court. Trials are already underway for members of the Revolutionary United Front and the Civil Defence Forces.

"May it please the court. The facts in this case, we allege, will show pain, agony, suffering, sorrow and grief far beyond human description, understanding, and reason."
David Crane

As he listened to Crane's opening address, Aiah Kungbana, 26, was immediately reminded of his own trauma. "I am a direct victim of the war," he explains. Aiah was born into a wealthy family in the northern Kono area, his father a physician educated in Germany. But when the rebels attacked Kono, Aiah's father was killed, his sister raped, and the rest of his family scattered. Aiah fled across the border into Guinea and eventually made it to England. When he returned to Sierra Leone at the end of the war, he initially planned to take revenge on his family's attackers.

"I went in search, but I never saw one of them," says Aiah, who now works for a local NGO called Action for Children in Conflict.

"Today, I think I am more mature, and if I saw them I would not take any action -- before I was fighting for myself, but now I think that these people - the prosecution at the Special Court - will fight for me, because they are standing for human rights."

True justice?

Betty Milton and Mohammed Fofanah were both amazed to see the defendants in court, dressed in sharp black suits. In the early years of the war, before the fighting came to Freetown, the Sierra Leonean army used to parade an occasional rebel through the city. "We would get word and rush to the streets to get a peek, to see men who looked dishevelled, with long hair," says Mohammed, 27, a journalist with the newspaper Awoko."They didn't look normal to us. But now, looking at [the defendants] today...they look like normal beings!"

Betty, Aiah, and Mohammed were all impressed to see notorious leaders transformed into pliant defendants. But as they listened to the atrocities allegedly committed by the AFRC, their thoughts turned away from the perpetrators toward the victims of the war. "People have suffered so much, and nothing has been done for them," says Mohammed.

"I'm happy for the Special Court. But we have to question the Special Court again. Is it true justice? True justice in the sense -- not just the proceedings, or looking at the atrocities committed and punishing [people] -- but how does it serve the purpose of the victims who have suffered?"

"This case will be proven by witnesses, the brave and courageous people of Sierra Leone who step forward to meet and slay the beast of impunity with the righteous sword of the law."
David Crane