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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 women victims and sheds light on the violations they have suffered under Jammeh’s dictatorship and their enduring impact on their lives and those of their families.

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 women’s political involvement.

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 of the youth-led organizations and movements shared in these discussions. It seeks to call attention to their larger revolutionary goals and to offer ways for policymakers, advocates, and donors to support these goals in their transitional justice work.

In most cases, to be imprisoned in Syria is to disappear. Tens of thousands of people, if not more, have been unlawfully taken prisoner or held incommunicado in the context of the Syrian conflict. This policy paper examines the dark reality of detentions in Syria, its impact on those who are detained and their families, and recommends a set of urgent steps that should be taken to assist families in obtaining information about the whereabouts of their loved ones, gaining access to them, and achieving their prompt release.

This report examines the police vetting in Kenya that was part of a broader reform in response to the 2007-2008 post-election violence, focusing on why civil society became disillusioned with the initiative. Drawing on interviews with civil society representatives and former members of the police commission, it explores the vetting's disappointing outcomes and the process itself, which exhibited a lack of responsiveness and transparency. The report is accompanied by a briefing paper and a policy brief, which offers recommendations on vetting more generally.

This policy brief presents recommendations for transitional vetting based on insights from research on vetting practice. It is meant to complement existing guidelines on vetting put forth by the United Nations and other international organizations. It defines vetting and the risks it faces and underscores the importance of strategy, information, managing uncertainty, and other critical elements. The brief accompanies a report and briefing paper on the recent policy vetting process in Kenya.

Colombia's Special Jurisdiction for Peace (SJP) aims to achieve criminal accountability through a mixed system of restorative and retributive justice. Generally speaking, the SJP envisions large-scale restorative justice measures involving public acknowledgments of responsibility, as well as concrete, symbolic, and collective reparations aimed at satisfying victims while simultaneously reintegrating perpetrators. This report describes the court’s mixed model, delves into its innerworkings, and critically assesses its restorative justice components and their impact.

On March 2 and 3, 2020, transitional justice and anti-corruption policymakers, experts, and activists from the Gambia, Kenya, South Africa, Armenia, and Tunisia met in Tunis for a two-day conference to share solutions to a common problem: How can countries emerging from dictatorship, war, or political transitions hold corrupt ex-rulers accountable, recover their ill-gotten assets, and ensure victims achieve justice and obtain reparations? This report gives an overview of the conference and its panel discussions.

The armed conflict in Northern Uganda, stretching across more than two decades, greatly affected the local populations, which suffered multiple forms of war crimes and gross abuses of human rights. This study assesses the opportunities for providing interim relief to victims of conflict-related human rights violations through targeted development programs, pending the establishment of a comprehensive reparations program.

Mexico is overwhelmed by criminal violence and human rights violations in ways that ordinary rule of law mechanisms cannot address. While not undergoing a political transition, Mexico could benefit from transitional justice experiences when designing policies for pursuing accountability and preventing future abuses. Doing so, however, requires careful adaptation to the country’s particular conditions. This policy brief explores opportunities for applying lessons from transitional justice in Mexico.