Resource Library

Building a constitutional state and pursuing social change is best approached by looking at prior successes. Here is a comparison between the Kenyan and South African constitutions and an outline of how constitutional litigation unfolded in South Africa.

The DDR process in Colombia aims to guarantee citizens their fundamental rights while at the same time to create space for the integration of demobilized armed groups. It remains to be seen if the Colombian DDR and transitional justice model can be implemented such that it satisfies b...

The DDR process in Colombia aims to guarantee citizens their fundamental rights while at the same time to create space for the integration of demobilized armed groups. It remains to be seen if the Colombian DDR and transitional justice model can be implemented such that it satisfies b...

Truth commissions can provide a stage for a potentially powerful encounter with the past (and present) at the level of public discourse. While their capacity to effect transformation in societies marked by patterns of identity-related marginalization and exclusion is limited (and the ...

Essential among South Africa's transition programs was a process to disarm, demobilize, and reintegrate ex-combatants and to create a new defense force integrating the armed forces of opposing parties into a united military structure. Yet, DDR remained largely independent from other t...

Essential among South Africa's transition programs was a process to disarm, demobilize, and reintegrate ex-combatants and to create a new defense force integrating the armed forces of opposing parties into a united military structure. Yet, DDR remained largely independent from other t...

Transitions focuses on unrest in Middle East and North Africa.. Hanny Megally, ICTJ Vice President for Programs, talks about demonstrations and upheaval in Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan and elsewhere.

In Colombia, international crimes can be tried under the ordinary national jurisdiction as well as a limited number of cases under the Justice and Peace Law of 2005 (JPL). Neither jurisdiction has served to highlight the widespread or systematic nature of state-sponsored violence. ...

In August 2006 the United Nations Security Council mandated the establishment of the Serious Crimes Investigation Team (SCIT) as an extension of the previous “serious crimes” process, under the UN Integrated Mission in Timor-Leste (UNMIT). Early in 2008, the team began assisting the c...

Providing the Minister for Social Solidarity with the unfettered discretion to dismiss and appoint members of the institute’s Governing Board renders the institute vulnerable to politicization and undermines the institute’s ‘technical, administrative and financial autonomy.

Timor-Leste has implemented a number of transitional justice mechanisms to address the legacy of human rights violations that occurred in relation to the 1975 Timorese civil war and 24-year Indonesian occupation.These mechanisms have failed to provide victims with meaningful reparatio...

Background on the challenges in addressing legacies of past violence in sub-Saharan African countries such as Uganda, Ethiopia and Eritrea. The fact sheet gives an overview of the situation in the region and ICTJ's approaches in promoting transitional justice in individual countries. ...

Background of the generations-long conflict in Colombia involving the state, the guerilla group FARC and paramilitaries. The shifting boundaries between drug trafficking and political crime remain a serious obstacle to efforts to promote accountability and respect for human rights in ...

The Documentation Affinity Group (DAG) was established in 2005 by ICTJ and five partner organizations as a peer-to-peer network with a primary focus on human rights documentation. Documenting Truth collects the best practices derived from the work of the DAG organizations in Cambodia,...

A wide array of international donors are working with Timor-Leste to help support reform in the security sector. While many of these programmes have had a positive impact, donor-driven security reform agendas have been under-coordinated. Fortunately, this is beginning to change, as ...

This update covers the first, complainant phase of the Anfal trial, which lasted for twenty-three sessions from August 21 to November 27, 2006. Seventy-six complainants presented testimony regarding their experiences during the Anfal campaign. Information is taken directly from obser...

As the first truth commission in the region, Morocco’s Equity and Reconciliation Commission sought to address the legacy of more than 40 years of repression and human rights violations known as the “Years of Lead.” The commission was part of a gradual process of dealing with the past,...

While not seen as sufficient in and of themselves as a means of reparation, the concept of “collective reparations” has been one of the ways in which reparation advocates have respond to practical challenges and to the overall complexity of responding to massive violations of human...

In July 2008 the Timorese-Indonesian Commission of Truth and Friendship (CTF) submitted its final report on atrocities committed in East Timor in 1999. Previously the CTF had been criticized by human rights groups, especially in relation to its power to recommend amnesties and its con...

This research brief provides case studies on the use of pardons in Argentina, Chile, El Salvador, Peru and South Africa following periods of mass abuse, and highlights subsequent political and civil society action to overcome impunity exacerbated by pardons and amnesties.

In Colombia, the shifting boundaries between drug trafficking and political crime and the tension between security and human rights pose particular challenges for those seeking accountability for past abuses and respect for human rights.

The Special Tribunal for Lebanon is an internationalized court that will sit in the Netherlands and seek accountability for a specific set of crimes in Lebanon. It remains to be seen whether or how the Tribunal might contribute toward accountability in Lebanon, but it is clear from ex...

Indonesia and Timor-Leste created the Commission for Truth and Friendship (CTF) bilaterally in 2005. The commission has not yet delivered substantive transitional-justice benefits, and its public hearings have seriously compromised the goals of truth and resconciliation. This report i...

On January 12, 2008, the Iraqi parliament passed the “Law of the Supreme National Commission for Accountability and Justice.” The new law replaces the earlier framework governing Iraq’s De-Ba’athification policies. This document is intended to provide a short summary and preliminary a...