Resource Library

Kenya is just days away from the 2017 general election, but challenges dot the horizon, including the recent assassination of an election official. ICTJ's Chris Gitari calls for a strong, accountable security sector and the implementation of the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission Report.

In 1986, Wachira Waheire was whisked off the street, taken to Kenya's most infamous torture chamber, and sentenced to four years in prison. Over the next 30 years, his quest for justice led him to meetings with his torturers to courtroom showdowns with the country's Attorney General. Discover his ongoing struggle for truth, acknowledgement, and reparations alongside all survivors of abuse in Kenya.

In Africa's Great Lakes region, countries face common challenges like bad governance, inequitable distribution of natural resources, and ethnic divisions. As nations like Burundi, Central African Republic and South Sudan work towards peacebuilding and accountability, they should learn from what has worked and what has not in neighboring countries, writes Sarah Kihika Kasande, ICTJ's Head of Office in Uganda.

A new ICTJ report argues that in Africa's interconnected Great Lakes region, each country’s attempt to provide justice for past violations offers lessons for similar processes in others. We gathered civil society activists from across the region to discuss which strategies have worked for them, which have not, and opened up about the greatest challenges they face in securing justice.

As Burundi and South Sudan teeter on the verge of renewed conflict, with warnings of possible genocides, a new report from ICTJ on the African Great Lakes region asserts that there are lessons to be learned from neighboring countries that may be relevant in preventing new conflicts. The report calls for a clear understanding of victims’ needs and demands, a thorough political analysis and identifying realistic opportunities for acknowledgment and accountability, among other measures.

The right to the truth carries special resonance in Kenya, and so on March 24th Kenyan state agencies, survivors, civil society organizations, and international partners will join together in Nairobi to observe the International Day for the Right to the Truth. It provides an opportunity not just for remembrance, but also for greater dialogue between the government and victims about the implementation of reparations programs and of the findings presented in the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission's final report.

South Africa Parliament faces a historic moment. In this op-ed, ICTJ's Vice President Paul Seils remembers the great hope that marked the ICC’s emergence: "No country embodied that hope and that reality more powerfully and more inspiringly than South Africa."

The Africa Union's resolution to collectively support a strategy to withdraw from the ICC looks more like a machination of those who have instrumentalized an argument against the court to protect themselves from the long arm of justice, write ICTJ's top experts on Africa.

As ICTJ looks back on its 15 years of work, join us in celebrating our allies across the globe who join us in the struggle for human rights, against impunity. To honor their efforts in the trenches of this shared struggle, we will bring you their stories in the weeks and months to come. We begin with Kenya's Jaqy Mutere, who provides both an empathetic ear and a political voice to survivors of sexual violence.

A groundbreaking new book from the International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) and UNICEF examines the complicated relationship between education, justice and peacebuilding in societies grappling with a legacy of violent conflict. It offers lessons on how education can be harnessed in a divided society to overcome the past and create the conditions for peace, often under very difficult circumstances.

In Cote d’Ivoire, avenues for education system reform are limited. To help youth find their voice, ICTJ and UNICEF facilitated an innovative truth-telling project led by Ivorian young people themselves. The result: an exploration of the unique experiences of young people during the conflict, told through radio broadcasts, public discussions and reports to government officials.

UN operations are due to end in Côte d’Ivoire next June, but the country must pursue a victim-centered approach to justice even after UNOCI leaves. An ICTJ-organized conference works to prepare government, civil society, and the diplomatic community for the UN departure and chart a way towards justice and a stable peace for all of Côte d’Ivoire.

Complementarity is an essential tool in the fight against impunity - by working together, national courts and the ICC can seek justice for the worst crimes. But how is the fight against impunity playing out in Côte d’Ivoire? And how exactly can the Ivorian judiciary and the ICC ensure justice in CDI? A new review of our Handbook on Complementarity examines those questions and assesses how the Handbook can be used in his country.

Prosecution efforts so far have exacerbated, rather than alleviated, ethnic and regional divisions. Credible prosecutions against those most responsible on all sides of the conflict would offer a clear statement to all citizens of Côte d’Ivoire that the justice system is blind to ethnicity and is there to serve and protect all its citizens.

A new paper from the International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) offers clear, concrete proposals for a new reparations policy in Côte d’Ivoire for victims of serious human rights violations. The recommendations, informed by extensive work in the affected communities, consider a range of options, including compensation (cash payments), rehabilitation, and symbolic measures.

In order to create lasting reconciliation between the victims of post-election violence and the Côte d’Ivoire state, the reparations program must respond to the most serious consequences of the violence for victims through measures that address their long-lasting socioeconomic, psychosocial, and education-related effects for victims and their children. To do that, ICTJ's Cristián Correa and Didier Gbery spent more than a year discussing needs with victims groups throughout the country.

The brazen abduction and brutal murder of human rights lawyer Willie Kimani, his client, Josephat Mwenda, and their taxi driver, Joseph Muiruri, underlines once more the urgent need for police reform in Kenya says ICTJ's Christopher Gitari.

Think you're an expert on how national courts and the ICC work together? Put your knowledge to the test!

The struggle against impunity remains as important –and precarious –as ever as we celebrate International Justice Day on July 17. ICTJ marks the occasion with a look at complementarity, a concept critical to understanding the role that the ICC and national courts play in this struggle.

Workshop gathers survivors of gender-based wartime violence to share experiences with policymakers and practitioners.

Evelyn Amony tells the harrowing story of her years in captivity with the LRA, and experience of grinding poverty and stigma after returning home with two children, in her new memoir, I Am Evelyn Amony: Reclaiming my Life from the Lord's Resistance Army. The autobiography, which tells the difficult truths of women and girls in wartime as only a firsthand witness can, will be launched today in New York, at the Japan Society.

The Ivoirian government has a critical opportunity to define and implement a reparations policy that responds to the needs of the most vulnerable victims of the political, military and social crises experienced by Côte d’Ivoire between 1999 and 2012, according to the International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ).

Today, ICTJ opened a two-day conference in Kampala, Uganda, gathering activists and officials from the African Great Lakes Region to discuss efforts at redress and accountability for serious human rights violations committed in their countries.

Civil society leaders, members of victims' groups and state officials throughout the Great Lakes region will convene in Kampala, Uganda next week at a conference hosted by ICTJ. Attendees will share their experiences working for redress in their communities and discuss what strategies have proven effective at the local level.

After consulting nearly 2,000 of their peers, youth activists in Cote d'Ivoire present their reparations policy recommendations in a special event on Friday.