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The Second International Criminal Defense Conference:
Lawyers, scholars and experts draw lessons

Openning of the conference

From TPIR heritage on Vimeo.        
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 The Second International Criminal Defense Conference ended last Sunday 23 May in the Belgian capital Brussels, after two days of enriching presentations and discussions on a variety of subjects relating essentially to the ‘ Lessons from the Defense at the Ad Hoc UN Tribunals, and Prospects for International Justice at the ICC’. Defense attorneys from the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), from the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY), and a former attorney at the International Criminal Court (ICC) as well as scholars in legal, media, history, memory studies; human right activists and authors, addressed an audience of about 150 people coming from all over the world. Many other eminent scholars could not attend but their papers were available in print at the conference.

Opening the conference, Law professor and defense attorney André Tremblay said: ‘No solution to the problems we will evoke here will come from the [ICTR] Registrar. No solution will come from the [ICTR] President. That is why our action should be directed to the UN Security Council’. Many issues were discussed, including poor health care for detainees that has cost the life of one of them, the review of trials which defense attorneys think is no longer a right but an exception, the partiality of the ICTR, its failure to contribute to reconciliation, the role and influence of media on conflicts and justice, foreign jurisdictions dealing with genocide suspects, the Rwandan legal system and its breach to human rights, among others. All the papers are to be found on this web site and the videos of the presentations made. A few analytical video reports are also available, as well as the impressions of some of the participants.

Statement of Ad Hoc Organizing Committee for the Bruxelles  Conference
Conclusions of the conference the

 From TPIR heritage on Vimeo.
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Louise Arbour was wrong to stop my investigation, says Hourigan

From TPIR heritage on Vimeo.
Former ICTR investigator Michael Hourigan has accused his former boss, chief prosecutor Louise Arbour of having ordered him in 1997 to stop his inquiry into the downing on 6 April 1994 of president Juvenal Habyarimana’s jet. This event is believed to be the immediate cause of the genocide that targeted the Tutsi minority and the political killings that followed.

“I Indicated that she was wrong and she said to me: ‘Are you questioning my authority?’. I said: ‘No. I was questioning your judgment’”, Hourigan said in a teleconference during the Second Conference on the Future of International Criminal Law organized from 21-23 May 2010 by ICTR defence attorney. Hourigan said that informants from within the Rwandese Patriotic Army, the current Rwanda Defence Forces came spontaneously forward and delivered information that ‘it is President Kagame and his own military who downed president Habyarimana’s aircraft’. The video above shows the entire teleconference.  

The conference was worthwhile- say participants

From TPIR heritage on Vimeo.
The 21-23 May 2010 conference attracted lawyers, scholars, students and other categories of people from different parts of the world. During the conference, which mainly but not exclusively aimed to voice the views of the ICTR defence lawyers about the International Criminal Law as applied by the ICTR, many issues were raised. Many of them raised the political ramifications of the Tribunal and the criticized the role of the Rwandan government in the process. In this short report, diverging views are gathered. The common point that emerges is that the conference was ‘worthwhile’ according to philosophy scholar Jean Mukimbiri, ‘interesting’ and ‘welcome’ for Peter Mutabaruka, a PhD student at Leicester University in the UK; and ‘a good initiative’, for former Rwandan ambassador to the UN Manzi Bakuramutsa. As for Eugene Rwamucyo, a medical doctor who spoke on moral harassment and used his own case as illustration, and who was recently arrested in France, he praised the conference for offering a chance to any one, to voice their views.