View Video | Voices from the Rwanda Tribunal

Everard O'Donnell
speaks on ...

the missions of the ICTR

Transcript0:00
If you read the original resolution, you see that the principal purpose of the tribunal was to effect individual justice against the perpetrators of the genocide in Rwanda during the a, actual year 1994, not outside it, in Rwanda and neighboring states.  So that was the, the actual geographical component of the mission and the temporal component of the mission.
0:31
But there was an added statement that – because of course this was the Security Council using its Chapter 7 powers which of course are peacekeeping powers and quite sincerely I think members of the Security Council – although academics regard this as debatable and you’re referred to the literature – the Security Council felt that setting up a judicial institution would bring reconciliation to the Great Lakes region, and . . .
1:02
Donald J Horowitz: That being Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda . . .
1:04
Yes, yes. The whole, the whole of the area around the Lake Victoria, and . . .
1:09
DJH: Okay.
1:11
So the mission was therefore expressly a peacekeeping mission. Now, one of the interesting things about that mission is that it was therefore, you have this interesting situation where the tribunal is set up for political purposes by a political body and it’s set up to deal with politicians and the witnesses come from a very politically intense area and there’s still a conflict between two parties in which you are trying one party.
1:45
And so the whole thing is intensely political. Nevertheless, the purpose as far as the Security Council was concerned was to bring reconciliation.