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As part of its ongoing support of the Committee of the Families of the Kidnapped and Disappeared in Lebanon, ICTJ organized a three-day virtual workshop on transitional justice for university students on July 12-14, 2021. The students all served as volunteers on a project to establish an archive of the committee’s work and activism over the past four decades and participated in a previous workshop in February 2020 that introduced them to transitional justice concepts.

Lebanon has yet to seriously address the issue of thousands of people who went missing or were forcibly disappeared during the country’s civil war. ICTJ spoke with Lebanese activists to discuss a recent initiative taken by the families of the missing and civil society organizations to create a draft law on the missing.

Last month ICTJ, with Saint Joseph University’s Modern Arab World Research Center and UMAM Documentation and Research launched the website “ Badna Naaref” (We Want to Know). This oral history project conducted by students tells the stories of suffering and survival during the war in Lebanon, serving both to commemorate and educate.

Transitional justice practitioners and activists from 18 different countries gathered in Barcelona to attend the 6th Intensive Course on Truth Commissions, organized by the ICTJ and the Barcelona International Peace Resource Center on September 29 - October 3.

The second Latin American Conference on Transitional Justice closed July 8. In the concluding remarks, ICTJ Truth and Memory Program Director Eduardo Gonzalez stated that while this conference has focused on sharing the comparative experiences throughout Latin America, this has not been an academic exercise but a call to action. Read more on the conference blog

In this episode of ICTJ’s podcast, São Paulo-based prosecutor Marlon Weichert provides an overview of how Brazil is dealing with the crimes of the past, through both criminal trials and a truth commission. [Download](/sites/default/files/ICTJ-Podcast-Brazil-Weichert-4-1-13.mp3) | Duration: 15:28 mins | File size: 10,870 KB

Brazil’s new government is showing strong support for the passage of a bill creating a National Truth Commission investigating past human rights violations, writes Eduardo González, director of ICTJ's Truth and Memory Program. ICTJ also spoke with Marlon Weichert, human rights activist and regional prosecutor for Brazil's Federal Public Ministry, on the current debate surrounding truth-seeking and accountability in Brazil.

ICTJ spoke with Marlon Weichert, prominent human rights advocate and regional prosecutor with the Federal Public Ministry of Brazil (Ministério Público Federal), on Brazil's pending truth commission bill and calls for accountability measures addressing past violations in Brazil.

Brazil’s recent decision to examine the abuses of the military dictatorship from several decades ago could change the face of democracy at home, making it more genuine and transparent. At the same time it could have a wider impact, allowing Brazil to take a decisive stand on human rights regionally and internationally.

ICTJ applauds Brazil’s momentous step toward the creation of a truth commission and notes opportunities to ensure its success. Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies approved on Wednesday a bill creating the National Truth Commission to establish the facts and responsibilities about crimes committed under the country’s military regime.

Although Brazil's dictatorship ended years ago, focus on transitional justice there is peaking now, as debate stirs over how to best address its past. Recent developments - including the Brazilian government's proposal of a truth commission, the opening of national archives, and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights' decision limiting the 1979 amnesty law - are at the core of the discussion. Eduardo Gonzalez, director of ICTJ's Truth and Memory Program, discusses the role accountability for the past can play in Brazil today.

ICTJ welcomes the appointment of seven distinguished experts as members of the Brazilian National Truth Commission. The government has taken a historic step to honor victims and ensure the people of Brazil know the full truth about the human rights abuses committed in their country; the pursuit of justice can only make Brazilian democracy stronger.

This opinion piece by Eduardo González, director of the Truth and Memory program at ICTJ, asks: can you build a solid, legitimate democracy on the sands of silence, or does truth provide a more trustful foundation?

For many years now, the International Center for Transitional Justice and other organizations have supported young activists and artists as they harness the power of art, culture, and new media to advance truth, justice, reform, and redress, not only where they live, but across borders and in collaboration with others. This innovative and inspiring work offers lessons about how to increase civic engagement and help societies know the truth about their country’s past and actively shape the national narrative.

Despite the overwhelming number of Lebanon's civilians killed, injured, displaced or otherwise harmed by decades of violence, there remains a near-total lack of official acknowledgment, reparation, truth about serious crimes or accountability for the perpetrators. ICTJ is pleased to release the first in a series of publications that aim to bring the crimes of the past in Lebanon to light.

Lebanon should take firm steps to provide redress to victims of past conflicts and help prevent future violence, ICTJ and Lebanese rights groups said today at a roundtable discussion in Beirut. Lebanese authorities have mostly failed in their responsibility to end ongoing violations and ensure justice and truth for victims of the 1975-1990 war and successive conflicts.

Lebanon has long been afflicted by a combination of political deadlock and a lack of accountability that has resulted in ongoing human rights violations and overall systemic rot. Comprehensive reforms, along with an inclusive truth-seeking process, broad public dialogue, and other way...

This report examines the situation of impunity in Lebanon that has persisted since the 1975-1990 war through the lenses of core elements of transitional justice. It analyzes Lebanon’s past experience of ineffective transitional justice measures -- including limited domestic trials, na...

In Lebanon, in the absence of an overarching curriculum, young people are growing up with scant knowledge of the country’s history. Young people want to understand the war so that they can address its legacy of violence and divisions and face the continuing violence and ever-present danger of...

ICTJ and the Human Rights and Atrocity Prevention Clinic at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law are pleased to announce a strategic research partnership to examine international law and practice regarding enforced disappearance and the missing.

New York, January 18, 2022— The International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) is pleased to announce the “Wide Awake Art Contest,” an open call to Lebanese and Tunisian artists as well as artists living in Lebanon or Tunisia to explore the theme “the Sound of Dissent.” The contest will showcase works by those who are documenting and memorializing their communities’ stories in times of instability, resistance, and change.

On February 4, 2021, the prominent activist, intellectual, writer, and filmmaker Lokman Slim joined the long list of victims of violence and impunity in Lebanon. The courageous human rights and political activist was found shot to death in his car in southern Lebanon.

BEIRUT, September 16, 2019—Nine months after the passage of Law 105 on Missing and Forcibly Disappeared Persons in Lebanon, the Lebanese Ministry of Justice nominated 10 individuals, including four women, to serve on the National Commission for the Missing and Forcibly Disappeared. The names have...

In this edition of the ICTJ Forum, we speak with Lynn Maalouf, one of the primary authors of a new report by ICTJ entitled Lebanon’s Legacy of Political Violence. The report compiles information on hundreds of incidents of serious crimes that took place from 1975 to 2008 in all parts of Lebanon.

Tunis, March 22, 2022­—The International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) will hold a series of cultural activities from March 21 through March 26, 2022, as part of its Wide Awake Art Contest. The contest, launched in January, invited Lebanese and Tunisian artists, as well as expat artists...