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91. Rape as Genocide: The Legal Response to Sexual Violence

Author:
Dr. Frances T. Pilch
Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Security and Democracy
Abstract:
The last decade has witnessed a profound transformation in the treatment of sexual violence in international law. The overwhelming evidence of the widespread use of rape as a policy tool in the former Yugoslavia, combined with the tragedy of the genocide in Rwanda, in which rape was also widely prevalent, has led to a legal reconceptualization of sexual violence in internal and international conflicts. The ad hoc tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, have genuinely broken new ground as they have confronted cases dealing with the complexities of rape, torture, and genocide. They have struggled with determining the legal definition of rape and finding a balance between the rights of witnesses and defendants. The revolutionary changes that have taken place in this area of the law in large part reflect the growing mobilization and influence of non-governmental organizations articulating the importance of the rights of women, and the increasing importance of the presence of women advocates, prosecutors, and judges.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Genocide, Human Rights, and International Law
Political Geography:
Europe, Yugoslavia, and Sierra Leone

92. Analyser le massacre. Réflexions comparatives

Author:
Jacques Sémelin
Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
Abstract:
This text aims to examine a particularly difficult phenomenon to study—slaughter—although it is at the center of many wars today and yesterday. Slaughter is defined as a generally collective form of action that aims to destroy non-combatants, usually civilians. Slaughter is viewed as an extremely violent, both rational and irrational practice growing out of an imaginary construct pertaining to someone to be destroyed, whom the torturer perceives as a complete enemy. The aspiration of this text is to show the relevance of exploring slaughter from a comparative standpoint. It will go beyond the mere case study, or rather it will put the best of these studies (on ex-Yugoslavia, Rwanda, etc.) into perspective. To better understand the process by which the slaughter is put into action, two main directions guide the analysis: historic depth: it is in fact difficult to attempt to understand the slaughters that took place in 1990 without taking into account occurrences in the 20th century, including those termed "genocides." transdisciplinary overture: slaughter as a phenomenon is so complex in itself that it requires the eye of the sociologist, anthropologist and psychologist, as can be seen in the following pages.
Topic:
Civil Society, Human Rights, Human Welfare, and Third World
Political Geography:
Yugoslavia and Rwanda

93. CERI: Les relations civilo-militaires en Croatie, 1990-2001

Author:
Jean-François Morel and Renéo Lukic
Publication Date:
02-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
Abstract:
In contrast to most of Eastern and Central European countries that underwent their post-communist transition peacefully, Croatia had to undergo its transition during wartime. The outbreak of the Serbo-Croatian war in Spring 1991 forced Croatia to build rapidly an army to protect its territory. However, at this time, Croatia was an emerging democracy and after the European Community recognised its independence on January 15, 1992, the parliamentary institutions were unable to exert their authority over the Croatian army (Hrvatska vojska, HV). The Croatian President, Franjo Tudjman, and the political party he presided, the HDZ, dominated the HV by way of political penetration. Tudjman, who led Croatia to independence, benefited from a triple legitimacy (political, constitutional and charismatic) that allowed him to exert his power over the HV, much the same as the legitimacy Josip Broz-Tito enjoyed over the Yugoslav National Army in Communist Yugoslavia. The result is that the civil-military regime in Croatia after 1990 suffered from a democratic deficit. After the death of President Franjo Tudjman in December 1999 and the change of majority in the January-February 2000 elections, the new Croatian leadership, particularly President Stjepan Mesic, tried to establish democratic control over the armed forces. However, this aim clashed with the opposition of the Ministry of Defense and of numerous officers still committed to the HDZ. For these reasons, a democratic civil-military regime in Croatia is not yet a reality. However, Croatia has made some progress toward the establishment of a democratic civil-military regime. By trying to join some international organizations (NATO), or by being compelled to cooperate with others (International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, ICTY), Croatia is now in the process of interiorizing the norms concerning the civilian and democratic control of the armed forces upon which these organizations are based. Being a member of the Partnership for Peace (PfP), and wishing to join as soon as possible NATO's Membership Action Plan (MAP), Croatia is obliged to move in this direction.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:
Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia, and Croatia

94. Inauguration of the Euroregion

Publication Date:
10-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
EastWest Institute
Abstract:
At the strong initiative of the Mayors of the ci ties of Niš, Skopje and Sofia, and with the active support of the EastWest Institute's Programme for Transfrontier Cooperation, a long-term process was launched to intensify transfrontier cooperation between the border regions of the Republic of Bulgaria, the FY R Macedonia and the FR of Yugoslavia. The overall objective of this initiative is to employ intensified cross-border cooperation as a tool for regional economic development and integration within this Niš-Skoplje-Sofia Triangle, as well as to foster conditions of prosperity, security and peaceful co-existence between neighboring peoples and states.
Topic:
Development, Economics, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Europe, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, and Macedonia

95. Seeking Justice on the Cheap: Is the East Timor Tribunal Really a Model for the Future?

Author:
David Cohen
Publication Date:
08-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
Over the past eight years the UN Security Council has paid some $1.6 billion dollars to operate International Criminal Tribunals in Yugoslavia and Rwanda. Successfully pressured to establish a tribunal in East Timor, the Council sought to cut its costs by creating a new form of tribunal—a "hybrid" tribunal with both international and domestic judges and partially funded and staffed by the national government. Today, though the hybrid tribunal is lauded by the United Nations as a model, the East Timor Tribunal is anything but. Of its meager $6.3 million budget for 2002, $6 million went to the prosecution, which nevertheless has failed to take any high-level perpetrators into custody. The balance was almost all for international judges' salaries, who sorely lack adequate administrative and clerical support. Though some steps have now been taken to improve the training of defense counsel, the Public Defender's unit is so under-funded and inexperienced that it did not call a single witness in any of its first 14 trials. Whether a minimally credible tribunal is better than none at all is the real issue the United Nations has not openly addressed.
Topic:
International Law and United Nations
Political Geography:
Yugoslavia, Rwanda, and Southeast Asia

96. Arming Saddam: The Yugoslav Connection

Publication Date:
12-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
The democratic government elected in Belgrade in 2000 did not end the extensive busting of arms sanctions engaged in for many years by its predecessor, the Milosevic dictatorship. The NATO (SFOR) troops who raided an aircraft factory in Bosnia.s Republika Srpska on 12 October 2002 found documents that have begun to strip the veils of secrecy from this significant scandal. From ICG.s own investigations, as well as from those initial revelations and stories that have appeared subsequently in the Serbian press, it appears that arms deals of considerable monetary value continued with Iraq and Liberia despite the change of administrations.
Topic:
Politics and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Iraq, Bosnia, Eastern Europe, Arabia, Yugoslavia, Arab Countries, and Liberia

97. Fighting to Control Yugoslavia's Military

Publication Date:
07-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica's 24 June 2002 sacking of Yugoslav Army (VJ) Chief of the General Staff Nebojsa Pavkovic was necessary, welcome, and long overdue. The EU, U.S., and NATO acclaimed the move as an effort to assert civilian control over the military, and Kostunica indeed deserves credit for removing a significant obstacle to the country's reintegration with Europe. Nonetheless, the action was probably more the result of the ongoing power struggle between Kostunica and Serbian Premier Zoran Djindjic than a genuine effort to bring the military under civilian control or dismantle the extra-constitutional parallel command structures that the post-Milosevic leadership of the country has created within the VJ.
Topic:
Ethnic Conflict, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia, United Nations, and Serbia

98. Still Buying Time: Montenegro, Serbia and the European Union

Publication Date:
05-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
On 14 March 2002 the leaders of Serbia, Montenegro and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) signed an agreement in Belgrade to replace FRY with a new “state community”: a “union of states” to be called “Serbia and Montenegro”.
Topic:
Politics and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia, Serbia, and Montenegro

99. Belgrade's Lagging Reform: Cause for International Concern

Publication Date:
03-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
For more than a decade Serbia was the driving force behind much of the instability in the Balkans. Following the overthrow of Slobodan Milosevic on 5 October 2000, it was hoped that Serbia would promptly reform the external policies of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) that had caused such disruption. To date, these hopes have been substantially disappointed.
Topic:
International Relations, Defense Policy, and Government
Political Geography:
Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia, Serbia, and Balkans

100. Serbia: Military Intervention Threatens Democratic Reform

Publication Date:
03-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
The Yugoslav Army's arrest on 14 March 2002 of a leading Serbian politician and a U.S. diplomat signals that for the first time the Army has openly entered the political arena and is explicitly attempting to set limits on political debate and policy. Serbian politicians will cross those red lines at their peril. The nationalist, conservative and corrupt military, which as the incident demonstrates is at least substantially beyond civilian control, seems intent on protecting important elements of the Milosevic legacy and is apparently now prepared to intervene more openly to influence negatively a broad range of policies, including the domestic reform agenda, cooperation with the Hague Tribunal, and relations with neighbouring countries. That Serbia is struggling to decide whether its course is toward the European mainstream or the reactionary polity of a Belarus should be of great concern to the international community.
Topic:
Defense Policy and Politics
Political Geography:
United States, Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia, and Serbia