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1. Truth, Accountability, and Asset Recovery: How Transitional Justice Can Fight Corruption

Author:
Ruben Carranza
Publication Date:
08-2020
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
The International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ)
Abstract:
On March 2 and 3, 2020, two weeks before the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a COVID-19 global pandemic, transitional justice and anti-corruption policymakers, experts, and activists from the Gambia, Kenya, South Africa and Armenia met with their counterparts in Tunisia for a two-day conference entitled, “Truth, Accountability and Asset Recovery: How Transitional Justice Can Fight Corruption,” organized by ICTJ with the support of Tunisia’s National Anti-Corruption Commission (INLUCC) and the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany. This diverse group of leaders came together 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 that those harmed the most by human rights violations and large-scale corruption can achieve justice, obtain reparations, and overcome marginalization? For many countries pursuing transitional justice, including those represented by participants in the conference, the health and economic impact of the pandemic has made it more urgent to find and design solutions that advance accountability for both human rights violations and corruption. In Kenya, for example, citizens questioned the government’s use of $12 million in COVID-19-related aid from the World Bank, “amid reports that the lockdown intended to curb the spread of the virus had worsened poverty, even forcing a mother to cook stones to make her eight children believe she was preparing food for them.” In Tunisia, INLUCC “identified 11 instances of suspected corruption and conflicts of interest” related to a government deal to acquire millions of facemasks. At the conference, participants brought up the role of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in enabling corruption during dictatorship or in facilitating state capture through privatization. Ninety-seven human rights and anti-corruption groups have jointly reminded the IMF, which has offered loans to pandemic-hit countries even as it continues to set austerity as a condition, that “transparency and accountability are key to making sure the money the IMF is disbursing actually goes to protecting lives and livelihoods.” This report gives an overview of the conference and its five panel discussions. It presents the thematic questions posed in each panel and summarizes the panelists’ statements and the comments and questions from moderators, other panelists, and participants in the audience. By design, the premise of the conference was clear: The practice by mainly global South countries of including accountability for corruption in their transitional justice processes has settled the debate over whether accountability for corruption should be part of transitional justice. In 2008, the Kenya Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission began investigating land-grabbing, large-scale corruption, and violations of economic and social rights. Soon after the Arab Spring in 2011-2012, Tunisia took the most significant steps when it established the Truth and Dignity Commission (TDC) with a mandate that covered violent political repression as well as corruption under former President Ben Ali. In its recently released final report, the commission examines the extent of the corruption and how the development policies and austerity measures imposed by international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the IMF enabled it. In 2016, the post-dictatorship government in the Gambia created a truth commission to examine human rights violations as well as a separate commission of inquiry to investigate ex-dictator Yahya Jammeh’s corruption and identify his ill-gotten wealth. The latter commission is now considering using part of those assets to fund reparations. Although corruption was excluded from the mandate of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, activists in 2017 created the People’s Tribunal on Economic Crime that linked the continuity of post-apartheid corruption to the failure to address it in earlier transitional justice processes. In 2018, the South African government then created the Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture to investigate specific economic crimes during and after apartheid. After the 2018 revolution in Armenia that ended a decade of authoritarian rule in the post-Soviet state, the new government embarked on prosecutions for corruption and human rights violations and is now considering a truth commission that would examine specific cases of corruption and human rights violations since 1991. These processes informed the conference, and the panelists who were directly involved in them discussed the challenges, successes, and lessons learned. This report’s original intent was to highlight the most important lessons from these experiences and promote South-South exchanges on transitional justice and accountability for corruption. However, the unprecedented global pandemic during which the conference took place has given it another equally relevant purpose. As ICTJ pointed out in a recent special report on COVID-19, “The pandemic is bringing to the surface underlying inequalities, including the unequal access to health care.” With this in mind, the author hopes this report will also offer policymakers practical approaches to transitional justice that can help address those underlying inequalities, such as measures aimed at improving access to health care for the most vulnerable, and initiatives to use recovered ill-gotten assets to fund reparations for victims.
Topic:
Corruption, Reform, Criminal Justice, Institutions, Reparations, COVID-19, and Truth and Reconciliation
Political Geography:
Kenya, Europe, Armenia, North Africa, Tunisia, Gambia, and Africa

2. More Than Words: Apologies as a Form of Reparation

Author:
Ruben Carranza, Cristian Correa, and Elena Naughton
Publication Date:
12-2015
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
The International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ)
Abstract:
It has become more common for political leaders to apologize publicly to victims, their families, and communities, often during a formal national address or other ceremonial event. Such apologies have taken place in the midst of cease-fire and peace processes, made not only by those holding public offi ce, such as heads of state, ministers, judges, and the heads of the police, military, and intelligence services, but also by paramilitary leaders. Apologies delivered by state agents signal the full backing of the state for what is being conveyed. Apologies are not enough as reparation to victims of serious violations. While apologies have value in themselves and can address both moral and physical harm, they should be combined with material forms of reparation. In particular, care needs to be taken to ensure that a disproportionate emphasis on apologies does not diminish the likelihood that other reparative measures, such as restitution and medical care, will be implemented, to help limit the long-term harm caused to victims or address their physical needs. Apologies should, in many cases, refl ect a communal reckoning with crimes of the past. They describe what has been learned and what needs to be done to prevent such events from ever happening again; sometimes they mark either the commencement or the culmination of a long, sometimes divisive period of debate and reflection in a society. In many cases, it is victims and organizations of survivors who provide the main impetus for pursuing an apology and help to decide when and how an apology might best be given. Whatever the catalyst, apologies (and the process for developing them) can help a country to replace, at least partially, partisan recriminations with constructive dialogue and unite the public behind the common goals it needs to achieve to move forward. Th e process of developing consensus around the need for an apology can help societies to face their past, reaffirm values, and meet their obligations to victims as human beings and citizens in the present and in the future. Because official apologies are most often public acts, they usually attract considerable media attention and scrutiny. Therefore, the content, delivery, tone, and proper timing of an apology are crucial. Th e most effective apologies are unequivocal; they are not diluted by qualifying language designed to limit their scope or redirect blame. For victims, it may matter whether an apology is written, handed over on paper, or read or spoken aloud. Likewise, the language spoken, the access to written, spoken, or recorded materials, the venue in which it is made, even the body language and appearance of the person delivering the apology are all significant. Some of the most meaningful apologies have occurred at the place where the violations occurred. Although most offi cial apologies provide a form of comfort to victims, some have been judged harshly for being poorly conceived, insincere, and ineffective. Expressions of regret, for instance, are most frequently statements of sadness and disappointment that fall short of an apology, whereas unequivocal apologies contain a more explicit if not unconditional acknowledgment of responsibility. They acknowledge the specific injustices that occurred, recognize that victims suffered serious harm as a result, and take responsibility for what happened. Effective apologies take into account what victims are likely to feel and think about what is being said. In fact, the most effective apologies are arguably those that have been agreed on with survivors, families of victims, or their representatives, and which address the future and not just the past. Th ey assure victims—and the rest of society—that victims were not at fault for what happened and emphasize common values shared by everyone in society. While apologies on their own cannot fully restore trust nor ever provide the full relief that victims and a society need to heal, they play an important role in giving meaning to reparations and promoting efforts to reform institutions and guarantee non-repetition of violations and can be an important step toward reconciliation, on the journey toward lasting peace.
Topic:
Transitional Justice, Reparations, Human Rights Violations, and Truth and Reconciliation
Political Geography:
Global Focus