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This multimedia project brings together voices of five Sierra Leoneans of different backgrounds reflecting on the legacy of the court as it nears the completion of its mandate.

On Thursday, January 13, 2022, the Higher Regional Court in Koblenz, Germany, convicted Anwar Raslan, a senior official in the Syrian government, for crimes against humanity. The landmark trial, the first ever to prosecute a member of Bashar al-Assad’s regime for such crimes, highlights a crucial component without which Raslan would never have been convicted: the role of victims in achieving justice.

The start of 2022 was marked by two important victories in the fight for justice and redress for victims of human rights violations in Syria. The first was the sentencing of Anwar Raslan, a former colonel in the Syrian intelligence service, to life in prison by the Higher Regional Court in Koblenz...

In 2021, there were significant developments, some hopeful and some devastating, in the struggle for truth, accountability, and redress in countries around the world. ICTJ experts covered these events in commentaries and feature stories published on our website and in our newsletters. While 2022 is already underway and we at ICTJ are hard at work, we would like to pause a moment to take stock and reflect on the year that was.

This study explores a transitional justice approach to the dilemma of foreign fighters in violent conflict. Such an approach can help center human rights in comprehensive responses to foreign fighters, and shift the current focus from security and punishment to justice and long-term p...

Image of Children looking through holes in a tent at al-Hol displacement camp in Hasaka governorate, Syria, on April 2, 2019.

New York, December 10, 2021—In contexts such as Afghanistan, Bosnia, Chechnya, Iraq, Somalia, and Syria, hundreds, sometimes thousands, of individuals have crossed national borders to engage in violent conflicts in which serious human rights violations and mass atrocities have been committed...

This study analyzes how transitional justice in Sierra Leone has contributed to prevention by responding to the grievances of those harmed by violations, reducing exclusion, addressing through institutional reforms the causes of past violence, and catalyzing long-term change. While tr...

This report summarizes the findings of an ICTJ research project on the contribution of transitional justice to prevention. Drawing from five country case studies, it contends that addressing the past can help to prevent the recurrence not only of human rights violations but also viole...

A young person with back facing the viewer is wearing a T-shirt that reads “Colombia in Peace"

The millions of Syrians displaced by the grinding decade-long war have sought out safety far and wide, in safe havens within the country, in neighboring countries in the region, and further afield. Those who managed to reach Europe often did so against the odds and often after experiencing displacement more than once. Now, one of these countries, Denmark , is taking away from Syrians living in its borders the protection they so desperately sought and still need and, with it, the tiny bit of hope that they have worked so hard to preserve.

For many victims of human rights violations and international crimes around the world, the prospects of holding perpetrators to account, especially high-level individuals, have long seemed farfetched, given current political and legal hurdles and the limitations of international criminal justice mechanisms. For this reason, the multiple ongoing investigations into international crimes committed in Syria and court cases against suspected perpetrators based on the principle of universal jurisdiction across Europe have offered a ray of hope in an otherwise bleak justice landscape.