Courts, the Hague

Over our last few days in the Netherlands, we visited three different international courts, got to observe a couple of trials, and got to talk to some really cool people.
The first one we went to was the International Criminal Court (ICC), which we learned about a lot in class. First we watched the case of a man named Lubanga, who was the first man arrested by the ICC since it officially opened in 2002. Lubanga is charged with child soldiering in the DRC. His trial has been going on for awhile, so it was kind of confusing to just jump into a random point in the trial and try to figure out what was going on. But it was really interesting too. I found myself staring at him most of the time, and I couldn't stop. It was just so strange to watch his reactions to what was going on in the courtroom. Most of the time, he didn't move a muscle. It must be weird to sit in the same place for months and months while the international community is trying to lock you in prison forever. He did look a little squirmy in his seat once in awhile though, especially when the witness started talking.
After we saw Lubanga's trial, we talked with a few workers at the ICC. The most awesome one was Fatou Bensouda, who is the deputy prosecutor of the ICC. She is probably the most powerful/ highest up female prosecutor in the world! and she was really cool because she had worked at the international criminal tribunal in Rwanda (ICTR), so we had a lot to talk about and a lot of insights to share. The one question she asked us was "how could Rwandan people, who are so incredibly friendly and welcoming, commit a genocide?" And I really think that question can be applied to anyone, from anywhere in the world, who has been a part of a genocide : how can anyone do such a horrible thing?
Anyway, we were all kind of contemplating this thought, because it really is mind-boggling. Rwandan people are seriously the nicest group of people I have ever met, and it's really hard to understand how some of them could take part in a genocide. We started discussing how Rwandans have kind of created and followed a culture of obedience to authority, which is really scary. In 1994, the authority said to kill, and many of them killed. Now, the authority is telling Rwandans to move on, and so many of them are moving on. I'm not trying to generalize and say that only Rwandans have a culture where it is so important to obey the people in power, or that this was the only cause of the genocide. But I really do thing the pressure in society to follow the authorities really played a huge role in what happened during 1994. Right now, it is a really good thing that the leader, Kagame, is sort of a "benevolent dictator." He definitely has, for the most part, been using his strict control of the country to work towards peace and national unity, and the people, for the most part, are listening. It is just really scary to think about what might happen when Kagame leaves office, for whatever reason. Anything could really happen; another genocide is possible. But we just have to pray that that won't happen.
At the ICC, we also had a few discussions about peace vs. justice. Can you achieve both, or is it easier to achieve peace without justice (like by issuing amnesties etc to end a war)? We began talking about this topic because of events that have taken place in Sudan. When the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Al Bashir, the current president of Sudan, for war crimes and crimes against humanity, he kicked all of the NGO's out of the country, causing so many problems for the people in Darfur. And Al Bashir still remains at large. In this case, the ICC was trying to achieved justice, but this caused a disruption in peace for the suffering people in Darfur. We talked with some people at the ICC about how arrests warrants, like Al Bashir's, may actually be counterproductive. But at the same time, the ICC workers pointed out that if you don't issue an arrest warrant now, when are you going to do it? when all of the innocent victims are already dead?
We also talked a little bit about good and evil. Someone asked us if we thought people could be truly evil. I've thought about this question before, but I think my opinion might be changing. I really used to think that no one is truly evil, but people can definitely do evil things. Now I don't know though; every time I hear about the absolutely horrible atrocities that people committed in Rwanda, I wonder more and more if there actually are truly evil people out there. Right now, I think the answer might be yes.
In the Hague, we also talked to some workers at the Special Court for Sierra Leone, which was set up after the civil war there. We were going to see the trial of Charles Taylor, who was the former president of Liberia who gave weapons/money with the rebels in Sierra Leone in exchange for diamonds that were mined by children and people under forced labor. But his trial was sadly postponed until the middle of July, oh well!
I still got to thinking a lot about diamonds though (and I thought of you Lauren, because we have had this discussion a few times!). I guess it is understandable why people like diamonds so much, I mean they are beautiful. But seriously so many diamonds are "conflict diamonds," and the ones that are not are probably mined under absolutely absolutely horrible conditions. Besides, the Kimberly process for certifying non-conflict diamonds was a complete failure; many people claim that the certified diamonds are not mined under conflicts/bad conditions, but often, they actually are. I love kanye west's song called Diamonds from Sierra Leone. I may have listened to it 45 times in the past two days.
We also went to the criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), which is the sister tribunal to the ICTR. It was interesting, but I didn't really know much about the problems in Yugoslavia before I went to visit the court. Actually, I still don't know much about it! But I did get to observe a really interesting trial, which was only cool because the prosecutor was not very good. She was actually horrible. Not that I could do any better or something, but we sat there for literally forty-five minutes, and she was only able to get out one question to the witness. The rest of the time, the judge was basically yelling at her for asking leading/stupid questions. And the defense lawyer, who was wearing one of those George Washington-looking wigs, kept standing up and objecting to everything the prosecutor did. I definitely learned a lot about court, but not that much about Yugoslavia. It was nice, because there was finally some action in the courtroom!
We also went on a tour of the international court of justice (ICJ), which tries cases between two countries, whereas the ICC tries individuals. It was cool, because it was in the amazing building called the Peace Palace. It pretty much is a palace; it was decorated like a queen should live there. That's cool, but the whole time I was wondering if the money used to build the court could have been used in a better way. Like maybe to help keep peace so that countries and people are less likely to need to use the ICJ or the ICC!?!?!
I will write more about the Netherlands soon, especially about the fun things we did there!
love colleen