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Begin New Search Topic Genocide Political Geography Africa

21. The International Criminal Court in Africa: challenges and opportunities

Author:
Makau Mutua
Publication Date:
09-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Norwegian Centre for Conflict Resolution
Abstract:
Norway's five-year experience as the lead nation of the Provincial Reconstruction Team This policy paper is a practically-oriented comparative analysis of the work of the International Criminal Court in Kenya, Uganda, Sudan, and the Central African Republic, and the policy implications for its work for Norway, States Parties, civil society, and key states. The paper argues that all actors, including Norway, should more seriously engage these African states – and key stakeholders within them – to facilitate the work of the ICC to stem impunity. Without such support, the paper concludes, the ICC's objectives in Africa will not be realised.
Topic:
Crime, Genocide, Human Rights, International Law, and Law
Political Geography:
Uganda, Kenya, Africa, Sudan, and Norway

22. Sudan: Fulfilling the Responsibility to Protect

Publication Date:
10-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect
Abstract:
Sudan stands today at a precipice. In 100 days the South will hold a referendum on self-determination with a vote for independence expected. Extensive early warnings exist indicating a real threat of the commission of mass atrocities surrounding the referendum, with those populations most at risk already identified. This threat looms while intertribal violence in the South is rising; conflict in Darfur persists; attacks by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in Central and Western Equatorial states continue unabated; and a return to war in the South is a possibility.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Ethnic Conflict, Genocide, and Religion
Political Geography:
Africa and Sudan

23. Sudan: Justice, Peace and the ICC

Publication Date:
07-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
The International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant against President Bashir for atrocity crimes in Darfur has brought Sudan to a new decision point. The longruling National Congress Party (NCP) has defied the court, gained African Union (AU) and Arab League pressure on the Security Council to suspend the case and restricted humanitarian aid in Darfur, putting several million internally displaced persons (IDPs) and others at risk. Darfur rebels have been emboldened, reducing prospects for diplomatic progress. Simultaneously, the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that ended the North-South civil war is unravelling. As a new U.S. special representative begins to make his mark, the international community may be ready to sacrifice the justice issue for a quick-fix deal that would ensure elections in 2010. But Sudan will have peace only when its impunity system is dismantled. The right course is to build leverage by strongly backing the ICC so as to persuade the NCP that it will only secure the deferral of Bashir's case by adopting and implementing serious reforms.
Topic:
Ethnic Conflict and Genocide
Political Geography:
Africa and Arabia

24. Scenarios for Sudan: Avoiding Political Violence Through 2011

Author:
Alan Schwartz
Publication Date:
08-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
Absent a change in current trends, further political violence in Sudan will be hard to avoid. Lack of governance capacity in the South and failure to resolve key issues between the North and South are important factors that can lead to political violence surrounding the referendum, slated for 2011, on whether the South secedes or remains part of a united Sudan. The parties need a shared sense of confidence about post-2011 futures. The North should be encouraged to cooperate in the referendum process and accept the outcome. The Government of Southern Sudan (GOSS) should devote more energy and resources to governance and service delivery rather than building military capability. The international community needs an assistance strategy focused on enhancing the GOSS's capacity to deliver services through local governments. The United States and the international community should pressure and assist the parties to promptly pass referendum legislation and address fundamental issues (e.g., oil and boundaries) before the referendum.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Political Violence, Genocide, Human Rights, and Armed Struggle
Political Geography:
Africa, United States, Sudan, and Arabia

25. The Responsibility to Protect (RtoP) and Genocide Prevention in Africa

Author:
Jenna Slotin, Castro Wesamba, and Teemt Bekele
Publication Date:
06-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Peace Institute
Abstract:
Within the United Nations, the concept of the responsibility to protect (RtoP) has regained considerable momentum after nearly two years of stasis following the 2005 World Summit. Outside the corridors of the world body, discussions about RtoP and its application to specific regional situations, as well as the mandate of the Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, one of the crimes specified in the Summit's Outcome Document, are still at a nascent stage. In order to contribute to rectifying this imbalance, the International Peace Institute, the UN Office of the Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, and the InterAfrica Group convened an expert roundtable on “The Responsibility to Protect and Genocide Prevention in Africa” in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on October 23 and 24, 2008.
Topic:
Genocide, Human Rights, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Africa, United Nations, and Ethiopia

26. La langue amère des temps nouveaux : dynamique de la violence au Rwanda rural

Author:
Emmanuel Viret
Publication Date:
08-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
Abstract:
Dealing with the dynamics of rural violence under the multi-party transition (1991-1994), this paper suggests new points of view on the mobilization of Rwandan peasantry during the genocide (1994). Going through local archives and interviews held in the hills and in four prisons of the country, the analysis focuses on the increasing development of an economy of violence. The multi-party system incited competing rural elites to recruit a growing number of men and ruffians against other contenders in order to assure their access to power. Local elites (re)formed patron-client links previously dried by the spreading of money and wage incomes in the countryside. Particular attention is paid to the dimension of political entrepreneurship and to the relationship between social brokers and rural elites, in the course of the struggle between political parties as well as during the building of the Power coalitions which led the massacres locally.
Topic:
Political Violence, Democratization, Economics, and Genocide
Political Geography:
Africa

27. Disaster in the DRC: Responding to the Humanitarian Crisis in North Kivu

Author:
Catherine Morris and Go Funai
Publication Date:
12-2008
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
This USIPeace Briefing discusses a recent event that focused on human security implications of resurgent violence which left hundreds dead, thousands displaced and millions destitute in North Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The conclusions and recommendations from this event highlight the importance of going beyond traditional short-term humanitarian interventions to adopt more comprehensive and sustainable solutions that effectively balance security and development.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Political Violence, Ethnic Conflict, Genocide, Humanitarian Aid, and War
Political Geography:
Africa and Democratic Republic of the Congo

28. The Crime of Genocide in Internatioanal Law and Underlying Social Structures of the Crime: Rwanda Case

Author:
Ebru Çoban
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Abstract:
Genocide is a crime which is defined under internatioanal law in the twentieth century and could not come about without the ideological, bureaucratic power of a modern state with is sanctions and modern discources on identities and modern classifications. With a non-modern Picture but with modern techniques of governing Rwanda was a place that genocidal killings occured and is a place of a breaking case for modern theories. Rwanda has modern state characteristics in terms of monopoly of use of violence, giving orders and providing obidience of its people, surveillance, classification and registration of its people, and keeping discourses. Morever, Rwandan culture that gives great importance to obidence and Rwandan geography that is so suitable to surveillance become additional factors. In that sense, Rwandan government could influence to daily life of the people even to the smallest details of anyone. All factors provided a suitable bas efor the crime of genocide.
Topic:
Genocide, Government, and International Law
Political Geography:
Africa and Rwanda

29. Who Intervenes and Why it Matters: The Problem of Agency in Humanitarian Intervention

Author:
Eric A. Heinze
Publication Date:
08-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Human Rights Human Welfare (University of Denver)
Abstract:
The debate over humanitarian intervention has tended to focus on the conditions under which the resort to armed intervention is permissible while paying less attention to which actors are best suited to engage in such a complicated and demanding undertaking. The purpose of this paper is to explore characteristics that affect the ability of potential agents of humanitarian intervention to effectively undertake this operationally and politically demanding task. While the military wherewithal of the intervener is fundamental, I argue that a potential intervener's legitimacy as an agent or enforcer of humanitarian norms is also crucial in determining whether and the extent to which it is a suitable agent. In other words, the efficacy of a potential intervener depends not only on its military wherewithal, but also on certain non-material factors than can affect its ability to effectively exercise this power. Using a consequentialist ethical framework, this paper examines the various material and non-material factors that can militate either for or against the suitability of certain actors undertaking humanitarian intervention in various parts of the world. I ultimately use this framework to examine the suitability of various possible agents of a potential humanitarian intervention in Darfur, Sudan.
Topic:
Genocide, Human Rights, Human Welfare, and International Political Economy
Political Geography:
Africa and Sudan

30. PolicyWatch #1253: Navigating the Sudan Sanctions Regime

Author:
Michael Jacobson
Publication Date:
06-2007
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On May 29, 2007, the Bush administration unveiled a long-anticipated package of sanctions against Sudan, designating thirty Sudanese companies for their ties to the regime of President Omar al-Bashir, as well as two government officials, a rebel leader, and a transportation company for their role in the Darfur genocide. In announcing the targeted companies and individuals, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson stated that Washington was "calling attention to their horrific acts" and attempting to "further isolate them from the international community." Although these sanctions do not impose significant additional legal restrictions on business dealings with Sudan, they could nevertheless have some impact if they are effectively implemented.
Topic:
Genocide and Sanctions
Political Geography:
Africa, United States, Washington, and Sudan