Refugee Rights News Volume 4, Issue 5 July 2008 On July 2, 2008, the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) Trial Chamber ruled that Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, a Congolese warlord and the first person ever to be arrested on ICC charges, should be released from detention. The ruling from the Hague is the most recent in a…
Refugee Rights News Volume 4, Issue 5 July 2008 On Monday, July 14, 2008, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Luis Moreno Ocampo, presented evidence to the Court’s Pre-Trial Chamber alleging that Sudanese President Omar El-Bashir has been responsible for ten counts of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in Darfur. The Pre-Trial…
Refugee Rights News Volume 4, Issue 2 April 2008 On February 6, 2008, Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui became the third war crimes suspect to be transferred to the International Criminal Court in the Hague. His transfer marks another milestone in ongoing efforts to address the impunity which facilitated widespread atrocities that occurred during the war in…
Volume 4, Issue 2 On February 19, Liberians in Buduburam refugee camp began a sit in protest. News reports and NGO accounts indicate that the protest was sparked by the introduction of a repatriation program. Refugees felt that the package being proposed by UNHCR was too little—and demanded more. Specifically, UNHCR’s spokeswomen in Geneva…
Volume 3, Issue 2 On July 21, 2006, history was made as former Liberian President Charles Taylor appeared in a courtroom in the Hague to answer eleven charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. The Netherlands has agreed to host Taylor’s trial and the United Kingdom has agreed to jail him in the event…
Volume 2, Issue 4 On October 11, 2005, Liberia held its first elections since 1997. This election has spurred many refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) to return to their homes in order to vote for their future leaders. Unfortunately, however, the way that the involvement of returnees in the elections was facilitated by the…
Volume 2, Issue 4 In our July newsletter we featured the efforts of African advocates to see justice done by seeing Charles Taylor handed over to the Special Court in Sierra Leone, where he has been indicted on 17 counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes. One such effort was a case that was…
When the meeting between Burundian and Rwandan government officials on Saturday June 11 ended, a decision had been reached. The two sides had decided to rename asylum seekers from both countries as “illegal immigrants” and treat them accordingly. What followed was a quick operation to deport thousands of Rwandan asylum seekers from Burundi. About…
Refugee Rights News Volume 2, Issue 2 July 2005 It has been more than two years since the Special Court for Sierra Leone indicted former Liberian President Charles Taylor for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Since then, Taylor has managed to evade justice, sliding from Liberia as rebels closed on the capital to comfortable…
Refugee Rights News Volume 2, Issue 1 May 2005 Over the past few months the Darfur Consortium, a network of Africa-based and Africa-focused civil society organizations, has been actively engaged in working towards finding a peaceful and just solution to the ongoing violence in Darfur. Exploring the situation on the ground In February, the Consortium organized…
Refugee Rights News Volume 2, Issue 4 November 2005 Algeria has been undergoing a long process of stabilization, since the rampant civil strife in that country began to taper off in 1998. Given the greatly improved security situation, the Bouteflika government launched a campaign this summer to encourage return of the estimated 1 to 1.5…