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In war-torn Yemen, COVID-19 presents an imminent danger to the country’s 30 million people, 80 percent of whom rely on humanitarian aid to survive. For more than five years, brutal conflict has devastated the country and its economy, infrastructure, and public services including the health care system. By most accounts, the likelihood is high that the disease will spread through Yemen as the number of cases in neighboring countries continues to grow.

For the past few months, ICTJ, along with our partners at the Center on International Cooperation at New York University, has been working on a comprehensive new policy paper on the situation of the many thousands of Syrians detained somewhere in the country’s vast network of prisons. The depravity that goes on inside these detention sites is already so appalling that it would have been hard to imagine when we started the project that the situation for the prisoners could get any worse. And then the COVID-19 pandemic hit, upending all of our preconceptions, and our lives, in ways none of us ever expected.

Today, we are facing a global public health crisis of unprecedented proportions. Only time will tell the devastating toll that COVID-19 will exact on human life. The breakneck speed at which the virus is spreading does not give us reason for optimism in the near future. We at ICTJ fully grasp the gravity of the situation, and we take our responsibility for the health and safety of our staff, partners, and communities where we work seriously.

ICTJ held a two-day workshop on transitional justice for a group of university students in Beirut on February 14 and 15 as part of its ongoing support to the Committee of the Families of the Kidnapped and Disappeared in Lebanon. The students are currently serving as volunteers on a project to create an archive of the committee’s decades-long struggle and activism.

This week, the International Criminal Court heard closing arguments in the trial of Dominic Ongwen, a top commander of the Lord’s Resistance Army in Northern Uganda. Among the 70 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity he faces are 19 counts of sexual and gender-based crimes, including rape, sexual slavery, and forced marriage—the widest range of such crimes ever to be brought to trial before the court. The case thus marks a milestone in the jurisprudence of these international crimes.

The United Nations Security Council has considered transitional justice on several occasions in the past and included many of its components in country-specific resolutions, and also stressed the links between transitional justice and the other items on its thematic agenda including women, peace and security, and children and armed conflict, and it has made explicit reference to transitional justice as a key part of efforts to sustain peace. Yet, on February 13, the Security Council held its first open debate focusing solely on transitional justice.

Tunis— On March 2-3, 2020, ICTJ is holding a conference in Tunis, Tunisia, on the fight against corruption and the recovery of ill-gotten assets as a critical element of transitional justice processes. The conference will bring together activists, policymakers, and experts from Tunisia and other countries in the global South emerging from conflict or authoritarian rule, including Armenia, The Gambia, Kenya, the Philippines, and South Africa.

Building on its work in Tunisia since 2012, ICTJ met with representatives of youth-led civil society organizations and social movements and state institutions involved in pursuing accountability for Ben Ali-era corruption. This paper focuses on the strategies and insights that members...

Youth activists in Tunisia have played a vital role in keeping corruption at the center of public debate since the country's revolution in 2011. Through decentralized, nationwide protest movements, young Tunisians have been calling for measures that root out systems of endemic corruption. ICTJ sat down with one youth leader to discuss her activism and views on Tunisia's transitional justice process.

New York— On February 26, ICTJ and NYU Law’s Center for Human Rights and Global Justice will welcome former President of Colombia and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Juan Manuel Santos for a conversation on the role of transitional justice in peace negotiations.

Eminent human rights defender José Zalaquett passed away on February 15. “Pepe,” as he was known by many, helped pioneer the field of transitional justice and inspired countless human rights defenders around the globe.

On April 4 last year, the commander of the Libyan National Army Khalifa Haftar ordered his troops to advance on Tripoli and “liberate it from terrorists.” Various stakeholders issued a multitude of statements and joint declarations after the assault, all asserting that only a political solution would resolve Libya’s crisis and threatening to hold accountable any faction that escalated the conflict. But in reality, most of the stakeholders have been playing two fields all along: the diplomatic one, in which they continuously reiterate support for political solutions and UN-led initiatives, and then the battlefield.

On February 12, 2019, the Assembly of the African Union adopted the African Union Transitional Justice Policy. The policy serves as a guide for member states on effective and credible transitional justice processes to achieve sustainable peace, justice, reconciliation, social cohesion...

PDF of the first page of the briefing paper "A Roadmap for Justice in Africa"

In its primary findings, Kenya's Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission noted that women and girls have been subject to systematic, state-sanctioned discrimination in all spheres of their lives, and that the state has failed to take measures to end the practices that restrict wo...

As subscribers, you enjoy timely commentary on what’s happening in transitional justice around the world written by one of our experts exclusively for our monthly World Report newsletter. In this month’s edition, we bid farewell to 2019 by looking back on the experts’ choices of the past year.

On December 12, ICTJ’s head of office for Colombia María Camila Moreno received the Alfonso López Michelsen Award for her dedicated work to advance peace and uphold international human rights and humanitarian law.

Lebanon’s ongoing “October Revolution” represents the largest decentralized, anti-government protest the country has seen at least since the end of the civil war in 1990. The demonstrations have brought thousands of Lebanese to the streets to condemn widespread corruption among the political class, paralyzing the country for weeks.

In countries emerging from violent conflict and repression around the world, prosecutors are facing significant challenges and pressures when seeking to investigate and prosecute serious crimes, such as torture, extrajudicial killings, and enforced disappearance. To reflect on these challenges, ICTJ together with the International Nuremberg Principles Academy, and with support from the governments of Australia and Sweden, convened a side event on December 6, 2019, during the 18th Assembly of State Parties of the International Criminal Court.

Since the Gambia's Truth, Reconciliation, and Reparation Commission (TRRC) began public hearings in January 2019, an important part of the country’s narrative has not yet come to light or been publicly acknowledged: the experiences of women. This report brings forward the voices of wo...

Banjul, The Gambia, December 11, 2019— Women from three rural areas of the Gambia will submit a report to the Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC) on December 16 that describes their experiences of sexual and gender-based violence during the dictatorship of former President Jammeh and the impact of the violations on their lives and families. In the report, the women join voices to offer recommendations to the TRRC and the Gambian government.

New York, December 4, 2019— "Get ready to speak up and be heard because your voice matters!”—that is the message a new guidebook released today on transitional justice sends to Syrian youth. Produced by ICTJ and Dawlaty, a Syrian human rights organization based in Beirut, the guidebook introduces the concepts of transitional justice to young audiences in an engaging and interactive way while capturing the challenges of applying them in difficult contexts.

This guide is designed to engage young people who are interested in or are working on transitional justice issues in their communities. Intended to serve primarily as a training tool, it provides basic information about transitional justice and related principles and offers tips and s...

For over a month now, Lebanese people have been in the streets peacefully calling for an end to corruption, economic disenfranchisement, and government mismanagement, calling instead for accountability and reform of the systems that have allowed these things to occur. The protests are historic for several reasons: their scope and magnitude, as well as the way they have unified a country that has for so long had division baked into nearly every aspect of life, down to its system of governance.

Between April 15 and May 3, 2019, ICTJ held a number of consultations with Kenyan youth from several informal settlements in Nairobi and Mombasa to reflect on their understanding of security sector reforms and their connection to the ongoing national dialogue process, particularly as ...

In its report, the Kenya Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission concluded that “corruption is endemic in Kenya” and that “there is a direct link between corruption and gross violation of human rights.” This paper considers the extent of impunity for corruption in Kenya, how corr...