INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT

Central African Republic & Uganda

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents – Cases: Central African Republic
ICC Public Documents – Situation in Uganda

Darfur, Sudan

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents – Situation in Darfur, Sudan

Rwanda’s Intelligence Chief Won’t Be Extradited to Spain
Wall Street Journal
By Nadim Roberts
August 10, 2015

A U.K. court has rejected an extradition case against Rwanda’s spy chief to stand trial in Spain for his alleged role in reprisal killings following the country’s 1994 genocide, Britain’s prosecution service said on Monday.

Rwanda’s intelligence chief Karenzi Karake was arrested in June at Heathrow Airport while embarking a flight to Rwanda. The arrest was made at the request of authorities in Spain, where he is wanted in connection with war crimes against civilians.

But on Monday, Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service said it didn’t believe an extradition offense could be established under U.K. law. “The main reason is that the relevant laws on the conduct alleged in this case do not cover the acts of non-U.K. nationals or residents abroad,” the CPS said.

Acting on this information, Senior District Judge Howard Riddle decided to discharge the European Arrest Warrant seeking the extradition of Mr. Karake, the CPS added.

Mr. Karake’s arrest had placed a strain on relations between Rwanda and the U.K. Rwandan government officials had claimed the charges were politically motivated and insulting, with the country’s president calling the arrest a “continuation of slavery, of colonialism, of violence and bigotry.”

Mr. Karake is a member of the Rwandan Patriotic Front, the current ruling party. He fought in the civil war that preceded the genocide. Previously, he was the deputy commander of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Darfur, Sudan. He left that post in 2009.

Human Rights Watch protested his appointment, accusing him of coordinating attacks against civilians when Rwandan forces were fighting Uganda in Congo in 2000.

The Spanish warrant stemmed from an indictment issued by a judge in 2008 that accused Mr. Karake, along with dozens of other Rwandans, of war crimes in the aftermath of the genocide. Mr. Karake was also accused of ordering the 1997 killing of three Spanish volunteers from a medical charity, Medicos del Mundo.

Rwanda’s Foreign Minister Louise Mushikiwabo said on Monday in a message on Twitter that she was delighted Mr. Karake would be coming home. “This was an unnecessary and abusive process,” she said.

A Spanish lawyer for plaintiffs seeking Mr. Karake’s extradition couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

South Africa: Judgment Reserved in Bashir Appeal Bid
All Africa
August 14, 2015

Judgment was reserved in an application by the South African government for leave to appeal a ruling that it should have detained Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir when he was in South Africa for an African Union (AU) summit.

A full bench of three judges of the High Court in Pretoria in June ruled that South Africa was compelled to arrest Al-Bashir and hand him over to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to stand trial on charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in Darfur.

They also ruled that the government’s failure to take steps to arrest Bashir was unconstitutional.

In strongly-worded reasons for their ruling, the judges said the democratic edifice would crumble stone by stone until it collapsed and chaos would ensue if the state did not abide by court orders.

They said a democratic state based on the rule of law could not exist or function if the government ignored its constitutional obligations.

Judge President Dunstan Mlambo, Deputy Judge President Aubrey Ledwaba and Judge Hans Fabricius also invited the National Director of Public Prosecutions to consider if criminal proceedings were appropriate.

Judge Fabricius on June 14 granted an interim order to the Southern African Litigation Centre (SALC) to keep Bashir in the country.

The full bench granted an order on June 15 for his arrest, pending a formal request by the ICC, but he was allowed to leave while the matter was before court. The South African government maintained that as a sitting head of state, Bashir enjoyed absolute immunity and it would have been unlawful to arrest him.

It also maintained that the UN and not the government had invited Bashir.

On Friday, Jeremy Gauntlett, SC, representing the government, argued that the court had granted an order which potentially reached “to the death or retirement of President Bashir, which could be a very long time”.

He said it was not unlikely that Bashir would visit the country or pass through South Africa again.

“This involves the conduct of international relations and gives rise to serious constitutional debate… It would not in principle be right to say the last word has been spoken on the issue.

“These are issues of fundamental importance to the constitutional and the international obligations of the country,” he said. Gauntlett argued that the order could affect other heads of state who were in a similar situation and could affect every future event of international significance to be held in South Africa.

“Whether South Africa is in a position to host African events without arresting invitees is of pressing practical relevance to government,” he said.

He submitted that the court order imposed domestic legal obligations under a court order which was inconsistent with domestic legislation and international law and ventured into a sensitive area of foreign policy, which was within the heartland of the executive arm of government.

“The court’s inference that government was able to prevent President Bashir’s departure, but deliberately repudiated the order, is contrary to the evidence before court.

“In such circumstances there are good prospects that another court may come to a different conclusion on government’s compliance with the interim order.

“There is every reason to afford both parties an opportunity to ventilate the decision on appeal. If this is not permitted, the practical legal effect will be that the question will never realistically arise again before a South African court, because no head of State liable to arrest would ever again enter South Africa.

“The implications for South Africa’s conduct of its international relations are both clear and profound,” he submitted.

Wim Trengove, SC, for the SALC, argued that the issue became moot when Bashir left the country and that any order granted on appeal would have no practical effect.

He said if they had been told during the course of the hearing that Bashir had left the country, they would not have continued with the application.

“The issue was whether government had a duty to arrest him. That duty disappeared when Bashir left.

“The matter is moot and this court has no discretion to grant leave to appeal… Courts do not settle academic issues.

“The court ceased to have jurisdiction when the general left the country,” he said.

He submitted that it was entirely speculative to say Bashir might come back or that he or some other fugitive of justice might be invited to visit South Africa.

Trengove argued that there was in any event no prospect of success on appeal because the ICC Act placed a duty on the South African government to give effect to an ICC warrant and it made no difference if he was a sitting head of State.

Wanted War Criminal Plans New York Visit
Front Page Magazine
By Stephen Brown
August 18, 2015

The Obama administration is definitely no longer acting “with a sense of urgency and purpose” when it comes to Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir, the world’s most prominent fugitive from International Criminal Court (ICC) justice.

The ICC indicted Bashir in 2009 on charges of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity committed in Darfur, an area in western Sudan, but has not been able to apprehend him. He is the only head of state on the ICC’s wanted list. But despite the international warrant for his arrest, the “Butcher of Darfur” is apparently planning, for the third time in three years, to visit the United Nations (UN) in New York.

“Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir belongs in only one place, the International Criminal Court…,” said Elise Keppler, a Human Rights Watch official. “A visit by al-Bashir to the U.N. would not only be an affront to Darfuri victims, but a brazen challenge to the U.N. Security Council, which was responsible for sending Darfur to the ICC for investigation in the first place in 2005.”

Sudan’s Deputy UN ambassador, Hassan Hamid, confirmed earlier this month that Bashir will attend a UN conference on sustainable development in September along with 150 other heads of state. One conference agenda has Bashir scheduled to address the General Assembly on September 26. But another agenda has Sudan represented only at the ministerial level.

Bashir is regarded as “the mastermind” of the Darfur genocide, which once figured so prominently in the media but is now largely forgotten. Before that, after coming to power in Sudan in 1989, he presided over a brutal civil war in southern Sudan, underway since 1983, that saw two million people perish and tens of thousands of black Africans enslaved. The war ended in 2005 and saw southern Sudan become an independent country.

Obama made Darfur an issue in his 2008 election campaign, possibly because the genocide’s victims were black Africans and this would resonate with African-American voters. A campaigning Obama stated correctly that “hundreds of thousands of men, women and children,” had perished at the hands of Sudan’s military and Arab militias, armed and directed by Bashir and his cronies, three of whom are also wanted by the ICC.

Darfuri black Africans, feeling neglected by a government that is dominated by Sudanese Arabs like Bashir himself, had launched an insurgency in 2002 against the Khartoum regime. As a result of the conflict, several million Darfuris have been racially cleansed with the greatest brutally, including enslavement of children. Several million Darfuris, all Muslims like the Sudanese Arabs attacking them, have lived now for years in refugee camps with return an unlikely possibility, their lands either laid waste or occupied by Arab settlers.

Bashir’s first attempted to visit America in 2013, applying for a visa to attend the UN General Assembly. He apparently was so confident of receiving one he “booked rooms at a hotel in midtown Manhattan.” The ICC fugitive even appeared to taunt the US authorities about his proposed trip.

“Those people (the American government), we put them in a corner…We can go to the US and no one can do anything to us because there is no law in America that affords US authorities the right to take any action against me because it is not a member of the Rome Statute (the accord that created the ICC),” Bashir said at the time. “Attending the General Assembly is our right.”

In the end, though, Bashir decided to stay home. A factor in his decision may have been that the Obama administration reportedly “dragged its feet” on the visa.

A proposed visit in 2014 was also aborted. A Sudanese UN diplomat said the US simply denied Bashir a visa “in violation of the U.N.-U.S Headquarters Agreement.” This accord obliges the United States, as the host country, not only to issue visiting national dignitaries visas, but also to grant them diplomatic immunity. But in 1988, the US refused to grant Yasser Arafat a visa to address the General Assembly, causing the UN to move its meeting to Geneva.

Bashir’s 2013 cancellation probably elicited a huge sigh of relief in the White House. His arrival in New York would have constituted a huge embarrassment for the Obama. Hosting a war criminal would definitely not fit the image of a Nobel Peace Prize recipient and Democratic president who claims to be a big human rights supporter. Especially one who personally had once spoken so loud and long against the genocide in Dafur.

There also existed an even greater potential for damage to Obama’s reputation. According to Fund For Peace, the ICC had asked the American government to arrest Sudan’s leader after his arrival on American soil, even though the United States is not a signatory to the Rome Statute. Again, failure to act on this request would have seriously undermined Obama’s credentials, especially in the eyes of his liberal and leftist supporters, as a defender of human rights.

The same ingredients for acute embarrassment still exist for Obama if Bashir appears in New York next month. But even if the proposed visit, like the others, does not occur, it still serves the purpose of highlighting Obama’s failed Sudan policies. The genocide that he once called “a stain on all of us,” saying he would not “turn a blind eye to slaughter” still continues, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).

HRW’s 2015 report on Sudan indicates the situation in Darfur may even be worse than when Obama was campaigning for president. Calling the UN-African Union military force in place to protect Darfuri refugees “largely ineffective,” the report outlines the Arab militias’ continued attacks on villages and civilians.

“They burned homes and shops, looted livestock, killed and robbed civilians, and forced tens of thousands of residents to flee towns and camps for displaced people,” the report reads. It adds that “450,000 people have fled violence in Darfur since the beginning of 2014.”

And the potential for genocide in Sudan, overall, is probably greater than in 2008. Government violence has spread to the Nuba Mountains in South Kordafon province where, again, a black African population has been under attack for years from government forces. Last month, Nicolas Kristof wrote in the New York Times that Bashir “blockades the area to keep out all food, medicine and supplies.”

“Sudan even bombs trucks carrying food, and its denial of food and medicine probably kills more civilians than bombings do directly,” Kristoff wrote.

Kristoff reports that Obama has “quietly provided food to the Nuba Mountains, thus avoiding starvation.” Medical shipments, however, are still desperately needed.

“But Obama overall has been weaker than the four previous presidents in standing up to Sudan,” Kristoff states.

The most glaring of Obama’s failed Sudan policies, however, is the fact that Bashir is still free and roaming the world six years after his ICC indictment. He has visited numerous countries, including China, since 2009, some repeatedly. Even more disgracefully, he now even dares to propose visiting America.

But why wouldn’t he? The White House’s response to Bashir’s still being at large has been one of inaction. The president who once deplored the genocide Bashir is still orchestrating has never launched a determined international crusade to bring him to justice. Obama, who often acts like he is answering a higher moral calling, appears in this case to have forgotten his moral obligation – and that black lives do matter.

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents – Situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Judge Fernández to Stay on Lubanga ICC Sentence Review Panel
International Justice Monitor
By Wairagala Wakabi
August 14, 2015

The Presidency of the International Criminal Court (ICC) has dismissed a defense application for the disqualification of Judge Silvia Fernández de Gurmendi from presiding over the upcoming review of Thomas Lubanga’s the prison sentence. The majority of a 15-judge plenary found that the functions Judge Fernández earlier performed in the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) were “irrelevant” to the proceedings to determine whether Mr. Lubanga’s 14-year jail sentence should be reduced.

In an August 3, 2015 decision, the judges determined that the functions performed by Judge Fernández when she was employed by the OTP appeared to have been strategic, high-level, and “relatively removed” from the details of the case against Mr. Lubanga. “There might be circumstances where Judge Fernández’s prior functions in the OTP could raise a reasonable doubt as to her impartiality, but the applicant failed to provide any concrete evidence pointing to such circumstances,” the judges ruled.

In March 2012, Mr. Lubanga became the first person to be convicted by the ICC. He was found guilty of conscripting and using child soldiers in active combat during an ethnic conflict in the Congo in 2002 and 2003. As of last month, the former president of the Union of Congolese Patriots and its armed wing, known as the Patriotic Forces for the Liberation of Congo (FPLC), had served two thirds of his sentence. A hearing to determine whether his sentence should be reduced pursuant to Article 110 of the Rome Statute is scheduled for August 21.

On June 15, Mr. Lubanga’s lawyers filed an application for the disqualification of Judge Fernández from the sentence review panel, citing her previous work with the OTP, which they claimed “manifestly cast doubt on her impartiality.” In particular, the defense highlighted Judge Fernández’s roles as Special Adviser and Chef de Cabinet to former Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo between 2003 and 2006, when she was involved in the application for a warrant of arrest against Mr. Lubanga and the confirmation of charges hearing.

However, according to the prosecution, “a reasonable and well informed observer” would not find the judge biased. Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda, in a July 3, 2015 response, argued that the threshold to disqualify a judge should not be interpreted to encompass all proceedings before the court involving an accused or convicted person. “A judge who has participated in some aspect of the main criminal proceedings should not necessarily be conflicted to review the sentence of a convicted person,” argued the prosecutor.

She stated that the sentence review was of a “limited purpose and nature” not related to the merits of the case, which had already been adjudicated. The prosecutor also stated that Judge Fernández was never directly responsible for investigating and prosecuting Mr. Lubanga.

In written submissions to the plenary, Judge Fernández stated that since being appointed as a judge, she had “systematically” avoided being involved in judicial proceedings arising from any case whose investigations commenced or were conducted during the time she worked for the OTP. The judge considered that “the distinct nature” of the sentence review did not warrant a request for her excusal because it “deals with the reduction of a sentence already imposed and entails the consideration of circumstances that may have arisen after the culpability of the person and corresponding penalty have been already settled by a Trial Chamber and ruled upon by the Appeals Chamber.”

Since the sentence review considers the time that has elapsed since sentencing and any new circumstance that may have arisen since, Judge Fernández did not see how any decisions or determinations that she may have made at the OTP could “color” her evaluation of the specific factors she must consider during the review.

However, two judges on the plenary were in favor of granting the defense request for disqualification. These judges noted that it was a case of “apparent, not actual” bias and the prudent approach would be for Judge Fernández to step aside “so as to protect the judicial process from the charge of bias.” In particular, the two judges were concerned that Judge Fernández’s earlier role with the OTP “might bear some relevance” to one of the factors to be considered by the sentence review panel: Mr. Lubanga’s early and continuing willingness to cooperate with the Court in investigations and prosecutions.

Four judges abstained from the decision due to a lack of sufficient information which “prevented them from formulating a distinct position” on the defense application.

Kenya

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents – Situation in the Republic of Kenya

The President of the Assembly of States Parties meets with the Chairperson of the African Union Commission and with the Bureau of the Committee of Representatives
ICC-CPI
August 14, 2015

On 13 August 2015, H.E. Mr. Sidiki Kaba, President of the Assembly of States Parties to the Rome Statute (“the Assembly”) of the International Criminal Court (“the Court”), traveled to Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) to meet with H.E. Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, Chairperson of the African Union Commission. During their exchanges, the President of the Assembly introduced the main priorities of his term and reiterated the need to develop a new relationship between Africa and the Court. He also emphasized the need to strengthen the judicial capacities of States to prevent and prosecute the most serious crimes contained in the Rome Statute.

President Sidiki Kaba also met with the Bureau of the Committee of Representatives to the African Union (COREP) and with the Chairs of the African regional groups at a meeting held in the presence of Ms. Djenna Djarra, Executive Secretary of the Commission. At this meeting, President Kaba welcomed the efforts undertaken by the African Union to fight impunity.

Furthermore, President Kaba met with Mr. Haile Menkerios, Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General to the African Union, with whom he had fruitful discussions on the peacebuilding efforts by the United Nations in Africa. In this regard, he reiterated that justice is an essential vehicle to ensure sustainable peace and break the cycles of violence that feed from impunity.

President Kaba also met with the Delegation of the European Union (“EU”) and with the representatives from EU member states in Addis, as well as with the representatives of the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States (GRULAC) accredited in Ethiopia. At these meetings, he urged them to continue supporting the Court.

At the conclusion of this official visit, H.E. Mr. Kaba stated:

“I thank President Dlamini-Zuma for her warm welcoming as well as the constructive exchanges we had. I am convinced that there is an urgent need to restore trust between the Court and African States Parties to the Rome Statute. The dialogue that we started today must be continued as we aspire to initiate a new era in the relationship between the Assembly and African States.”

ICC Appeals Chamber reverses decision on Kenya’s cooperation and remands issue to Trial Chamber for new determination
ICC-CPI
August 19, 2015

Today, 19 August 2015, the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) reversed Trial Chamber V(B)’s decision regarding the Kenyan Government’s alleged non-compliance with its obligations under the Rome Statute in the case The Prosecutor v. Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta, due to errors in the Trial Chamber’s assessment. The Appeals Chamber hence remanded this decision to the Trial Chamber V(B) to determine, in light of relevant factors, whether Kenya has failed to comply with a cooperation request that has prevented the Court from exercising its functions and powers and, if so, to make an assessment of whether it is appropriate to refer Kenya’s non-compliance to the Assembly of States Parties (ASP).

On 29 November 2013, the Prosecution had filed an application for a finding of non-cooperation against the Kenyan Government, alleging that the Government had failed to comply with a request to produce records relating to Mr Kenyatta. On 3 December 2014, Trial Chamber V(B) rejected the application for referral of the matter to the ASP. The Prosecutor appealed this decision on 20 March 2015.

Today, Judge Silvia Fernández de Gurmendi, Presiding Judge in this appeal, delivered a summary of the judgment in an open court session. She indicated that the Appeals Chamber considered that Trial Chamber V(B) erred by failing to address whether judicial measures had been exhausted to obtain the Kenyan Government’s cooperation, as well as by assessing in an inconsistent manner the sufficiency of evidence and the Prosecutor’s conduct. The Appeals Chamber found that these errors prevented the Trial Chamber from making a conclusive determination on the existence of a failure to comply with a cooperation request by the Court and affected the Trial Chamber’s decision not to refer the matter of Kenya’s non-compliance to the ASP. The Appeal Chamber hence reversed the Trial Chamber’s decision and remanded it for the Trial Chamber for a new determination.

The Appeals Chamber emphasized that in determining whether there was a failure from a State to cooperate, the Trial Chamber should take into account all relevant factors, including the evidence that was required in the cooperation request and the conduct of the parties to the proceedings. The Trial Chamber should determine whether judicial measures to obtain the cooperation had been exhausted and consultations had reached a deadlock. In addition, Trial Chamber V(B) should have avoided conflating the status of the criminal proceedings against Mr Kenyatta with the issues relating to the Kenyan Government’s cooperation.

Background: In accordance with the Rome Statute, the Court’s founding treaty, all States Parties are obliged to cooperate fully with the ICC in its investigations and prosecutions. Where a State Party fails to comply with a request to cooperate with the Court, thereby preventing the Court from exercising its functions and powers, ICC Judges can make a finding of a failure to comply with a request for cooperation by a State, which prevents the Court from exercising its powers and functions under the Statute and decide to refer the matter to the ASP, or the United Nations Security Council if the latter had referred the situation to the Court, to seek external assistance to obtain cooperation with the request at issue or to otherwise address the lack of cooperation by the requested State. The ASP and the Council may then decide to take the measures they deem appropriate.

Mr Kenyatta was charged, as an indirect co-perpetrator, with five counts of crimes against humanity allegedly committed during the post-election violence in Kenya in 2007-2008. Charges were confirmed on 23 January 2012, and the case was committed to trial before Trial Chamber V(B). On 13 March 2015, Trial Chamber V(B) decided to terminate the proceedings in this case and to vacate the summons to appear against him, noting the Prosecution’s withdrawal of charges against Mr Kenyatta. The Chamber also stressed that, although the proceedings shall be terminated, the Court retains jurisdiction over any interference with a witness or with the collection of evidence, and that the protective measures ordered for witnesses and/or victims shall continue, subject to the review by the ICC.

Libya

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents – Situation in the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya

Lawyers to appeal sentences handed out to Libyan regime-era officials
International Bar Association
By Tom Westcott
August 10, 2015

Defense lawyers in Libya are preparing to appeal against sentences handed out last week, including nine death penalties, for war crimes allegedly committed by senior officials from the regime of Muammar Gaddafi during Libya’s 2011 uprising.

A week after the pronouncements had been made, lawyers complained that they had still not received copies of the documents from the court ruling.

‘Time is precious to us because we have only 60 days to appeal,’ said lawyer Ibrahim Aboisha.

He is representing two clients – Gaddafi’s former head of intelligence Abdullah Senussi and the man who served as his right-hand man, Abdulhamid Amar Oheida, both of whom were among the nine sentenced to death by firing squad.

‘We only heard the sentences in the court, like everyone else who was present, but we must see all the details and the reasons why the judge made the ruling and gave such sentences before we can prepare our appeal,’ Aboisha said.

The verdicts were passed by judge Naji Al-Amin on 28 July, in a purpose-built courtroom inside Tripoli’s Hadba prison facility, where most of the accused men have been held.

The death sentences were a dramatic finale to the mass trial of 36 regime-era senior officials and Gaddafi’s son Saif Al-Islam. The often slow-moving proceedings had drifted on for over a year with scant international attention, after Libya’s security situation deteriorated forcing most embassies and international organisations to relocate to neighbouring Tunisia.

Sentenced in absentia and having apparently had no meaningful legal representation throughout the trial, Saif was also handed the death penalty. His sentence is little more than a symbolic gesture, however. Under Libyan law, Saif would have to be retried in person and he continues to be held in the mountain town of Zintan, which is not under the control of the Tripoli government.

The verdict was also pronounced in spite of a long-standing demand from the International Criminal Court (ICC) for Libya to hand over Saif to the Hague, where he is wanted for crimes against humanity. The Libyan authorities – under successive and now rival post-revolutionary governments – have continued to appeal against the ICC’s demand, insisting that its judicial systems were competent to try Saif.

The Tripoli Justice Ministry said that, since the ICC had agreed that Libya’s court was deemed competent to try Senussi, the same rule should apply to Saif. However, his ongoing absence from the court proceedings (appearances via video-link stopped last summer) and a lack of independent verification of either his whereabouts or wellbeing, continues to cast a shadow over the proceedings against Saif.

At the Tripoli Appeals Court, 23 other defendants were given prison sentences, ranging from life imprisonment to five years, and large fines. Four men were acquitted and released immediately after the proceedings, and charges were dropped against a fifth who was deemed mentally unfit to stand trial.

‘I was shocked when I heard the verdicts,’ said another lawyer whose client received a prison sentence, and who spoke on condition of anonymity. ‘My client’s sentence is much too long, and it is for nothing.’ Calling both the accusations and the case presented by the General Prosecutor weak, he said he was certain his client was innocent. Like Aboisha, he was waiting to receive the court documents, to prepare an appeal.

The trial has been condemned by international human rights organisations as failing to meet international fair trial standards while having been plagued with human rights violations. Amnesty International called the proceedings ‘deeply flawed’ and said the Libyan authorities had failed to ensure the defendants’ due process rights had been met.

Richard Goldstone is Honorary President of the IBA’s Human Rights Institute. ‘There are serious allegations of a denial of fair trial rights of the defendants,’ he said, voicing concerns about the conditions in which defence counsel and witnesses could be protected and perform their duties. ‘This is especially of concern in cases such as the present one where some of the defendants have been sentenced to death. There should be a full reconsideration of the proceedings by the Supreme Court of Libya.’

The Head of Investigations for the General Prosecutor’s Office, Sadiq Al-Sour, has repeatedly said that defendants’ rights had been met, citing access to medical care, family visits, and investigations carried out in a ‘comfortable atmosphere’ and only by the General Prosecutor’s office. He also insisted that the court was completely impartial, despite it operating in Tripoli, which is controlled by a self-appointed, and not internationally-recognised, government.

However, such insistences seem to carry little weight amidst the powerful international backlash against the proceedings. They have also been undermined by the widespread circulation on social media sites across Libya of a video showing another of Gaddafi’s sons, Saadi, being tortured in Hadba prison, the same facility where most of the defendants have been incarcerated, and the location of the appeals court itself. The nine-minute video-clip shows Saadi being blindfolded, slapped, beaten on the soles of his feet and forced to listen to another man being tortured in an adjacent room.

Despite international concerns and regardless of a general amnesty for regime-era figures declared by Libya’s internationally-recognised government which is now based in the east of the country, lawyers believe the next two months are unlikely to see any meaningful reversal of, or change to, the sentences.

‘It is not looking promising. As long as the circumstances here remain the same, the result will be the same,’ Aboisha said. ‘But if the circumstances change and the appeals stage is fairer, then I am full of hope.’

Exile or death: violence and collapsed State leave human rights defenders with few options
FIDH-Worldwide Movement for Human Rights
August 12 2015

In Libya, human rights defenders have become prime targets for many armed groups involved in the ongoing civil war, reveals The Observatory in a report published today. Violence, harassment and intimidation are daily occurrences for these defenders, in a climate of impunity resulting from the breakdown of the State. The respect of human rights defenders as vital, non-partisan voices should be a baseline consensus for any successful agreement between parties to the conflict.

“No democratic society can exist without human rights defenders. They are the keystones in the construction of a State that protects and empowers the people. The situation they face is unbearable and puts at risk the entire process of building a sustainable democracy in Libya. Therefore, we call on the international community and all the parties to include them in the negotiations and to provide them with shelters for their protection”, stated Gerald Staberock, OMCT Secretary General.

The report illustrates this catastrophic situation through the stories of 24 human rights defenders, several of whom have been killed. Others have been kidnapped, received violent threats against them or their family. Their places of work have been broken into and subject to arson. Threatening phone calls, defamation, and exile in neighbouring countries are regular occurrences for Libyan defenders.

In this polarised context with no room for independent voices, no male or female citizen promoting the respect for human rights and democratic principles is out of danger. However, those most often targeted by acts of violence are lawyers, judges, representatives of government institutions and national or international human rights organisations, journalists and those who defend the rights of ethnic minority groups.

According to the testimonies of human rights defenders, the authors of these violations are mainly members of various non-State armed groups, particularly those belonging to the fundamentalist Islamist movement (in particular “Fajr Libya”). Sources have told the Observatory that Islamist armed groups keep “black lists” of targets containing the names of persons who promote democratic ideals and defend human rights and gender equality, values diametrically opposed to those promoted by Islamist armed groups.

The judicial institutions that do exist include in their founding statutes their allegiance to various tribes, warlords, and non-State actors, effectively legalising these entities. In some cases, these armed groups actually fund the judicial institutions themselves. These groups have gone on to replace State institutions by infiltrating them and rendering them dysfunctional.

With the support of the international community, Libya is currently participating in a process to reach an agreement to stabilise the country. The process will specifically address the protection of human rights and human rights defenders. However, some paramilitary groups and militias have deserted the negotiations. Their return to the negotiating table, upon which the success of the process depends, should be contingent upon their strict commitment to respect human rights. Human rights defenders must also be actively included in the process. Only under these conditions can a State respectful of basic human rights be established.

“Today in Libya, human rights defenders are forced to cease their activities or to go into exile in order to stay alive. However, even in exile, most Libyan human rights defenders face a very precarious situation. The host countries must examine the possibilities for supporting and facilitating the granting of refugee status to them”, declared Karim Lahidji, FIDH President.

Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast)

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents – Situation in the Republic of Cote d’Ivoire

Ivory Coast Court Convicts Top Pro-Gbagbo Security Officials
Voice of America
August 5, 2015

A military tribunal in Ivory Coast on Tuesday convicted two top officials in former president Laurent Gbagbo’s security forces of crimes related to the West African nation’s 2011 civil war.

Ivory Coast, the world’s biggest cocoa grower, has seen rapid economic revival under President Alassane Ouattara but is still struggling with issues of reconciliation and justice.

About 3,000 people died in the conflict, which was sparked by Gbagbo’s refusal to acknowledge his defeat by Ouattara in a late 2010 presidential run-off election.

Anselme Seka Yapo, the head of former first lady Simone Gbagbo’s security detail, was found guilty of wilful murder and assault and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

The gendarme officer, known as Seka Seka, was accused of murdering the driver of Joel N’Guessan, a senior member of Ouattara’s RDR political party, and of beating his bodyguard.

In addition to his prison sentence, Yapo was also expelled from the gendarmes and will not be permitted to leave his home district for 10 years following his release.

Jean-Noel Abehi, who headed Gbagbo’s elite mobile gendarme squadron, was convicted of disobeying an order from superiors not to fight in support of the ex-president. He was sentenced to five years in jail.

Abehi, who was accused by a panel of U.N. experts of organizing a series of deadly raids from exile after the war, was arrested in Ghana in 2013 and handed over to Ivorian authorities.

Six other gendarmes on trial were acquitted of desertion.

Laurent Gbagbo is awaiting trial before the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague for alleged crimes against humanity.

Simone Gbagbo is wanted by the court on similar charges, though Ivorian authorities have so far refused to extradite her.

Rights groups have accused Ouattara’s government of prosecuting Gbagbo supporters while ignoring crimes committed by the president’s own backers.

All three ICC indictments relating to Ivory Coast target Gbagbo and his allies though the ICC prosecution have said it will expand its investigations by the end of the year to pursue all sides in the conflict.

In a report released on Tuesday, New York-based Human Rights Watch senior international justice counsel, Elizabeth Evenson, said: “Additional ICC investigations are necessary, but the focus so far on pro-Gbagbo forces has deeply polarised opinion within Ivory Coast about the ICC.”

The ICC: Too Important to Let Fail
The Globe and Mail
By Elizabeth Evenson
August 7, 2015

This month, the International Criminal Court will present its budget request for next year to the court’s 123 members, including Canada. The ICC is the only permanent global court with a mandate to prosecute the world’s worst abuses, whether in Darfur, Libya or Congo. But budget negotiations have become increasingly fraught.

Just as its workload began to increase (to eight countries from five between 2010 and 2013), some ICC members, with France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Britain in the lead, began to insist the court undertake reforms and cap its budget. They cited the global economic crisis and budget crunches at home.

The pressure to limit growth has eased in some corners but not in Canada, which has become the leading advocate for holding down ICC budget increases. In the past couple of years, Canada has not stood in the way of increases in the ICC’s budget agreed to by all other member countries, but it has made clear it intends to apply a non-growth stand to all international organizations, including the ICC. That will have disastrous effects if Canada wins the day on the ICC. Zero growth for the ICC is simply not tenable, even in times of austerity. The 13-year-old court is just hitting its stride, completing first trials, grappling with complex and important situations, and facing demands for justice in more places. It is at pains to keep up.

Consider Ivory Coast. A new Human Rights Watch report on the ICC’s work in the West African country paints a picture of a court struggling to make sure the justice it delivers actually counts.

The ICC prosecutor opened investigations in 2011 into horrific abuses during the country’s 2010-2011 post-election crisis. Attacks both by forces allied with former president Laurent Gbagbo and by those with current President Alassane Ouattara killed at least 3,000 civilians. But the prosecution focused initial investigations on crimes by pro-Gbagbo forces. It has signalled it will continue its investigations into all sides this year but, until now, the only cases opened, including the one against Mr. Gbagbo, relate to one side of the conflict.

The result is polarized opinion about the court and a lack of access to justice before the ICC for victims of pro-Ouattara forces. Resulting perceptions of bias in the ICC’s work in Ivory Coast have damaged its legitimacy in that country. And even the court’s outreach around these existing cases was too narrowly focused to engage more Ivory Coast citizens in the ICC’s work.

Lessons from the court’s work in Ivory Coast likely apply, to varying degrees, across all countries where the ICC has investigations.

The problems cannot be explained by a lack of resources alone, but they are a factor. The ICC lacked the money to put a full-time staff member in Ivory Coast to provide information to the public and journalists. Making do with missions conducted from the court’s headquarters in The Hague contributed to the narrow reach of these efforts. And while a budget crunch cannot explain away the prosecution’s initial decision to focus on only one side, it has been a factor in allowing the situation to persist; the ICC prosecution has cited its need to focus on other investigations – and a lack of resources to be everywhere at once – to explain the prolonged delay in getting to other cases in Ivory Coast.

Even if court officials could have made different decisions in Ivory Coast, to apply the lessons from its work there across the countries where the ICC is working – and where it may work in future – it will likely need more resources.

While Canada may have allowed some budget increases to go through, its insistence on zero growth, like the insistence of other ICC member countries before it, risks distorting budget discussions. It moves these discussions toward an arbitrary bottom line, rather than where they need to be: firmly focused on whether the ICC has what it needs to make a difference where it matters, for victims and for communities that have borne the brunt of mass atrocity.

Member countries do need to scrutinize the court’s requests for resources and demand accountability for its use of funds. But as human-rights crises continue to pile up, the ICC’s mandate to hold abusers to account is too big to let the court fail, and yet the Canadian position risks leaving the court too small to succeed.

Military Group Takes on New Mantle
IOL News
August 16, 2015

A militant youth group linked to Ivory Coast’s ICC-indicted former president Laurent Gbagbo took on a new mantle this weekend, turning itself into a political party and pledging to work for peace.

The Congress of Young Patriots (COJEP) was set up 14 years ago by hardline youth leader Charles Ble Goude, who along with Gbagbo is awaiting trial in The Hague by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity during unrest in 2010-2011.

Renaming itself the Panafrican Congress for Justice and Equality but keeping the same initials, the new COJEP said in a statement it aimed “to fight for peace” while steering clear of extremists, and that it would not contest upcoming presidential elections.

Goude’s “Young Patriots” militia have been accused of perpetrating some of the worst atrocities in the bloody unrest that broke out after a general election in December 2010, claiming more than 3 000 lives in the once prosperous country.

A statement from Goude, sent from his cell in The Hague and read out to supporters at the founding meeting, said: “I call on all my strength for inclusive discussions between the government and opposition, and for peaceful elections.”

The first round of the presidential elections are set for October 25, and are seen as crucial for stabilising the country after the post-election crisis of 2010-2011, which was the last chapter in a decade of political and military crisis in the Ivory Coast.

Nogbou Hyacinthe, an academic, was named as executive secretary of the new party in Goude’s absence.

AFRICA

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR)

Official Website of the ICTR

Chad

Growing Insecurity Leads to More Displacements in Lake Chad Region, Warns UN Officials
All Africa
August 6, 2015

The United Nations today reported further population displacement in the Lake Chad region owing to fear of attacks by Boko Haram and appeals by the Government of Chad for civilians to leave areas where ongoing military operations are being undertaken against the group.

“For a few weeks now, more than 40,000 people have been fleeing their villages for fear of attacks, without any belongings,” said the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Chad, Thomas Gurtner.

“The Lake Chad islands still face sporadic attacks and the Government is considering relocating some additional 20,000 people to the mainland, therefore increasing vulnerability among displaced population and host communities,” he added.

On 3 August, an estimated 10,000 people fled to the locality of Koulkimé, some 20 kilometres from the town of Baga Sola, in the Lake Chad basin, bringing the total of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the region to around 40,000, according to the latest update by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Overall, some 79,000 civilians have been forced to flee their homes since the beginning of the year, including refugees, returnees and IDPs.

The UN system is working with partners to implement immediate life-saving assistance to this new displaced population, as the area is prone to cholera outbreaks, Mr. Gurtner said.

The volatile security situation and the rainy season are limiting physical access, slowing humanitarian assessments and response. Despite these challenges, three spontaneous IDP sites near Baga Sola have been provided with basic supplies, food and wash kits.

According to OCHA, the humanitarian community is concerned with the growing trend of forced displacement of civilians in the region.

“As elsewhere in the Lake Chad Basin, which straddles four countries, and where people have been affected by violence, the humanitarian community calls on authorities to ensure that any measures taken to counter terrorism comply with the Member States obligations under international law, particularly international human rights law, international refugee law, and international humanitarian law,” it stated.

Chadian President Claims Boko Haram Leader Dead
All Africa
By Eugene Ndi
August 13, 2015

Chad’s president, Idriss Deby Itno, has claimed that Aboubakar Shekau is no longer the leader of the Boko Haram jihadist group.

At a press conference on the occasion of the 55th anniversary on Tuesday of Chad’s independence, President Deby said the Nigerian extremist group has a new leader.

He did not say what had happened to Abubakar Shekau, the declared leader of the group, but he said he had been replaced by a certain Mahamat Daoud who was ready to dialogue with the Nigerian government.

Speculation regarding Shekau’s ‘death’ is rife amongst countries involved in the war against the extremist group.

This speculation is further heightened by the fact that the ‘leader’ of the group has not appeared in Boko Haram’s videos of late.

NOT LAST LONG

“Boko Haram is decapitated. There are little groups (of Boko Haram members) scattered throughout east Nigeria, on the border with Cameroon. It is within our power to definitively overcome Boko Haram,” President Deby said.

The Chadian leader even declared that the Boko Haram war will not last long after the setting up of the regional force headquartered in N’Djamena. “It will be over by the end of the year,” he said.

Earlier, in March, President Deby had called on Shekau to surrender or be killed.

He claimed Chadian forces knew his hideout, and that if he refused to surrender, “he will suffer the same fate as his comrades.”

While claiming progress in the fight against the jihadists, who have repeatedly hit border areas of Cameroon, Chad and Niger, and wrought havoc in northeast Nigeria, Deby admitted that suicide bombers still posed a threat.

In the past few week, suicide bombers, many of them women, have staged several attacks in Nigeria, Cameroon and Chad.

The challenge, Mr Deby said, was to “avoid terrorist acts and that’s why we must organise at the regional level to prevent bomb-making materials and other explosives entering our countries”.

Where’s Shekau? Chad President messes with Boko Haram’s Mind
Reuters
By Alexis Akwagyiram and Julia Payne
August 14, 2015

If Chadian President Idriss Deby is to be believed, Abubakar Shekau, the bearded and bandoliered leader of Islamist militant group Boko Haram, is no more.

Given the many previous reports of Shekau’s demise, followed soon after by videos of him brandishing automatic weapons and spouting invective against the Nigerian state, analysts and diplomats are treating the claims with caution.

However, two factors are spicing up the normal guessing game that swirls around the leadership of the notoriously opaque group, which has killed thousands of people in its six-year campaign to establish an Islamic caliphate in northeast Nigeria.

First, Shekau – not known for being camera-shy – has not appeared on video for six months, raising the possibility that he has indeed been injured or killed by offensives during that time by Nigerian, Chadian and Cameroonian troops. And second, Deby has identified a successor.

Although little is known about the replacement, identified by Deby as Mahamat Daoud, it suggests that even if Shekau is not down and out, he may have a rival for control of an organization long suspected of being riven by factional divisions.

Besides the battlefield setbacks Boko Haram has suffered, disagreements over whether to entertain negotiations with Abuja or declare allegiance to jihadist groups such as Islamic State in Syria and Iraq are believed to have deepened those rifts.

“Boko Haram has always been something of a constellation of units, with its hardline leadership having only limited control or influence over some fighting units,” said Roddy Barclay, senior Africa consultant at Control Risks.

“Regional military pressure is likely to have fragmented militant command structures, though it remains uncertain whether a change in leadership has actually occurred.”

“HEAD CUT OFF”

The possibility remains that Deby, a wily regional operator who came to power in a 1990 military coup and who has survived several armed attempts to remove him, is trying to engineer internal blood-letting by promoting one faction over another.

“We have cut off Boko Haram’s head,” said Deby, who has turned Chad’s fight against Boko Haram into a personal duel with Shekau. “I think Boko Haram will be finished by the end of 2015.”

The new leader Daoud was open to the idea of talks with Abuja, Deby added.

What little is known about Daoud suggests he and Shekau do not see eye to eye, especially on the issue of the extreme violence that Boko Haram has meted out under Shekau’s leadership, diplomats and analysts said.

“It may be a tactic to sow disunity within Boko Haram,” one Abuja-based diplomat said. “This man, Daoud, has not been fighting or close to the Shekau group. He’s more of a learned cleric.”

Nigerian security analyst Fulan Nasrullah concurred, saying he understood Daoud to be around 38 years old and the son of an Arab man and Chadian mother renowned for his Islamic scholarship and loyalty to tenets laid down by sect founder Mohammed Yusuf.

Yusuf’s largely peaceful movement advocating sharia law and Islamic schooling — Boko Haram means “Western education is forbidden” in the local Hausa language — turned violent in 2009, and quickly morphed into a full-on insurgency after Yusuf’s death in police custody.

Since then, thousands have been killed and more than a million displaced by the militants who at the start of this year controlled an area the size of Belgium. Much of that territory has since been retaken by Chadian and Nigerian forces.

Nasrullah said Daoud had a significant support base and could bring hundreds of fighters with him if he jumped ship — as well as vital information about Boko Haram’s workings and the whereabouts of its top commanders.

“He could expose the money generation and transfer methods the group uses, reveal critical intelligence about the group’s inner structure, and maybe even offer up information as to how to kill Shekau,” he said.

“If Daoud is really seeking negotiations, the Nigerian government should hurry and take the offer

as having him on side could well be a game-changer.”

SCEPTICISM

Shekau’s last video appearance was in February, when a person claiming to be him — analysts believe he may have impersonators — threatened to disrupt presidential elections held the following month.

The group has released at least five videos since then, none purporting to show Shekau.

However, one source in the office of Nigeria’s National Security Adviser played down Shekau’s absence from the videos, and remained skeptical of Deby’s assertion that Shekau is dead, saying he “wouldn’t make too much of that statement”.

Femi Adesina, a spokesman for President Muhammadu Buhari, who came to power in March on promises of, among other things, tackling Boko Haram, said Abuja was open to talks if any faction with significant influence came forward.

“If genuine leadership of Boko Haram approaches the government for negotiation, the government will negotiate with them,” Adesina said.

Mali

Mali: UN Alarmed at Release of Human Rights Abusers; Warns De Facto Amnesty Contrary to International Law
UN News Centre
August 11, 2015

The United Nations human rights office expressed deep concern over the reported release of detainees in Mali suspected of involvement in, or formally charged with, serious abuses, including war crimes, terrorist acts and gross human rights violations.

Ravina Shamdasani, spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), said: “We understand that a number of those released on 16 July 2015 were implicated in such crimes and are concerned that further releases may be imminent.”

Any measure that would, de facto, amount to amnesty would be contrary to international law, and in violation of the commitment by the parties to the Peace and Reconciliation Agreement.

“We emphasize the critical importance of the fight against impunity and the need to investigate and prosecute all gross violations of human rights, to ensure accountability,” she underscored.

Amnesties that prevent the prosecution of individuals who may be legally responsible for war crimes, crimes against humanity and gross violations of human rights are inconsistent with States’ obligations under various sources of international law.

“We urge the Government to ensure that any releases made in the context of confidence-building measures are in full conformity with international law, and to take all measures to ensure the investigation and prosecution of all serious crimes under international law,” the spokesperson continued.

“The judicial authorities in Mali should pursue the investigation and prosecution of all alleged perpetrators of war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity and other gross violations of human rights, and ensure that the rights of victims to an effective remedy are promoted and protected.”

OHCHR also condemned the atrocious attacks on civilians in the Byblos hotel in Sevaré in Central Mali between Friday and Saturday last week.

“Such attacks, which appear designed to provoke a state of terror and intimidate, are in violation of national and international law. We call on the international community and neighbouring states to give all possible assistance to Mali in its ongoing efforts to restore peace, security and the full respect for human rights,” Ms. Shamdasani concluded.

Mali: The Deadliest Peacekeeping Mission In The World
International Business Times
By Erin Banco
August 15, 2015

Gunmen dressed in plain clothing ran up to the Byblos Hotel in the central Malian town of Sevare last week, opening fire at the few government soldiers who were protecting its entrances. The gunmen barged through the doors of the hotel with one mission in mind: to take as many people hostage as possible. Some hotel employees and visitors hid in cupboards, while others were detained by the militants. The siege lasted more than 24 hours and ended when the military stormed the hotel. In all, 12 people were killed, including civilians and members of the United Nations peacekeeping mission.

The attack on the hotel in Sevare was just one of many this year that have focused not only on civilians and government soldiers but also on members of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in the country. Last month, six U.N. peacekeepers were killed in an attack by Ansar Dine rebels in Timbuktu, an area that the rebel group moved into in 2012 during the political unrest in the country. Ansar Dine, designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. in 2013, formed during the Malian political turmoil of 2012. All the peacekeepers attacked were from neighboring Burkina Faso.

The U.N. has reported 54 of its peacekeepers have been killed in Mali this year, making it the world’s deadliest peacekeeping mission at present. The mission in Mali has the highest average yearly fatality rate for all peacekeeping missions, according to U.N. figures. The organization just approved funding for one more year of the mission, and things are already off to a rocky start under the new accord. The force is now dealing with new, unprecedented threats in the southern part of the country, which until recently had remained largely muted.

Mali’s deteriorating security situation and tough terrain constitute conditions similar to those peacekeepers have faced in other countries, including Sudan, Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Between 2001 and 2015 to date, there have been 255 peacekeeper deaths in Congo alone. From 1960 to 1964, there were 249 peacekeeper deaths in that country. Meanwhile, 220 peacekeepers have died during the ongoing African Union/U.N. hybrid operation in Darfur, Sudan.

“We are working in a very difficult environment, an environment with asymmetric threats such as those posed by terrorists and those posed by rebels that engage in drug trafficking,” said Radhia Achouri, a representative of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Mali.

As of last month, the U.N. mission in Mali consisted largely of about 9,100 military personnel deployed at 12 different locations throughout the country. About another 1,000 people are deployed as police. The members of the mission come from 68 different countries. The goal of the mission is to support, monitor and supervise the implementation of ceasefire agreements and to protect civilians.

Mali has been mired in violence since 2012 when ethnic Tuareg rebels overthrew the government. The ousting of President Amadou Toumani Toure created a vacuum that allowed for the rise of extremist rebel groups connected to al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), a branch of the broader al Qaeda network. The government of Mali requested international help, and French forces intervened, followed by the U.N. peacekeeping mission. Since then, the government and rebels have attempted to sign peace agreements, but talks have broken down each time. The Malian government and a semimoderate ethnic Tuareg rebel umbrella group signed a peace deal in Bamako in June, but it is unclear whether that pact will hold given the recent violence in the country.

There are dozens of rebel groups in Mali, some connected to the Tuareg rebel movement, others connected to AQIM. Several of the Tuareg rebel groups dominant in the north signed the recent peace deal with the government, with both sides promising to put down their weapons. But other groups, specifically those connected to AQIM, made no such promise and are now — more than at any time since the beginning of the year — attacking convoys and outposts of the Malian military and the U.N. peacekeeping mission in the country.

“Mali’s governmental presence is not particularly robust in the north,” said Hilary Matfess, a researcher with the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. “AQIM might be focusing its efforts on the most robust military security presence there, which is the U.N. mission.”

The northern part of Mali is still an area of concern for Malian officials, but the southern part is also becoming more violent, especially within the past two weeks as Ansar Dine has ramped up its attacks near the capital. The group is associated with the Saudi-inspired Salafist/Wahhabist brand of Muslim ideology, even though most people in Mali identify with the Sufi sect — often defined as a faction of Islam that follows the inner, mystical aspects of the religion.

Ansar Dine attacked towns on Mali’s borders with Ivory Coast and Mauritania last week, and leaders of the group say they are planning more raids. The group’s new threat prompted Ivory Coast forces to carry out a mission inside Mali Wednesday in an attempt to track down rebels who are believed to be hiding in the Sama forest.

Statements by the group’s leaders and the attacks carried out by rebels within the past week mimic those of groups such as Boko Haram, the Nigerian militant group that is trying to expand from its land in the country’s Borno state to Chad and Cameroon.

Ansar Dine and other extremist groups are only growing stronger, especially with the growing drug- and human-trafficking networks in the region. Each year, thousands of migrants from places such as Burkina Faso, Niger and Sierra Leone, as well as Mali, pay as much as $500 apiece for smugglers to take them north to Libya, where they get on a boat and head to Europe. This year, a record number of migrants have attempted to make the journey to Europe, the U.N. said last month.

Given the security difficulties in the country, the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Mali has frequently asked Geneva for better equipment. In a recent U.N. report, the head of the Mali mission said his forces are frequently targeted by armed groups and his troops do not have the necessary weapons to ward off attacks.

“We need to be fully capable of facing this environment in all aspects,” Maj. Gen. Michael Lollesgaard, the commander of the peacekeeping mission in Mali, said in the report. “That means capability to face hostile armed groups hiding amongst the population and to face challenging climates, geography and infrastructure.”

Mali: UN Condemns Violations of Ceasefire in Kidal Region
UN News Centre
August 17, 2015

Fighting erupted over the weekend in northern Mali’s Kidal region between armed groups, breaking the ceasefire and prompting the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the country, known as MINUSMA, to issue a firm condemnation.

“Pending the conclusions of the investigation team today dispatched to Anefis, MINUSMA condemns in the strongest terms these acts, perpetrated in blatant violation of ceasefire agreements and of the Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation in Mali”, to which both rival groups – the National Movement for Liberation of the Azawad (MNLA) and the Plateform Coalition – are signatories.

Fighting resumed on August 15 in the town of Touzek Oued, located at the south-east of Kidal and between Tabankort and Anefis, also in the North Mali, points out a press release.

“The international community, as well as the population, is concerned by the increasing number of these violations, which could hinder the progress made towards a stable and lasting peace in Mali.

MINUSMA reminded the parties that they will have to answer for their actions before the Security Council, which, on 29 June, said that it would consider targeted sanctions against those who obstruct or threaten the implementation of the Peace Agreement.

Urging the armed groups to immediately cease fighting, the Mission, adds the statement, stresses that it will not hesitate to take “all necessary measures” to protect civilians, in accordance to its mandate and rules of engagement.

U.N. Deploys Troops Around Northern Mali Town After Clashes
Reuters
By Tiemoko Diallo and Adama Diarra
August 18, 2015

Mali’s U.N. peacekeeping mission deployed troops around a northern separatist stronghold on Tuesday, seeking to prevent an escalation of clashes between rebels and pro-government militias that threaten to torpedo a peace deal.

The separatists, led by Tuareg tribesmen, and the pro-government Platform militias signed the U.N. sponsored peace accord in June. Its aim was to pacify the north and allow the Malian army to focus on tackling Islamist militants in the west African country.

The two sides have traded blame for the clashes, which began on Saturday. On Monday, Platform fighters seized the town of Anefis from the separatist Coordination of Azawad Movements (CMA), raising the prospect they could advance on the town of Kidal, the group’s main stronghold.

“These acts constitute a flagrant violation of the ceasefire and the peace accord,” the U.N. mission, MINUSMA, said in a statement.

MINUSMA called on both sides to immediately return to the positions they occupied on Aug. 15, and said it was putting in place a security zone extending 20 km (12 miles) around Kidal to prevent a spread of the violence and to protect civilians.

“In the case of a violation of this security zone by Platform elements or those affiliated with the Platform, MINUSMA will react in accordance with its mandate,” the mission said.

There are over 9,000 U.N. peacekeepers in Mali, 90 percent of them in the north. The U.N. force did not specify how many troops were deployed around Kidal.

The move was criticized by the separatists and the pro-government militia, while the Malian government called on the U.N. mission to remain within its mandate of protecting the civilian population in all parts of the country.

“Any unequal treatment will produce perverse effects that would harm the search for peace,” government spokesman Choguel Kokala Maiga said on state television.

No clashes were reported on Tuesday. A Reuters witness said CMA fighters were reinforcing positions around Kidal and deploying heavy weapons.

Fahad Ag Almahamoud, the secretary general of the GATIA pro-government militia, slammed the U.N. mission for handing part of Mali’s territory to a rebel group.

“We do not understand this decision by MINUSMA,” he said.

Mohamoud Ag Ghaly, secretary to the president of the CMA, said the group had no need of U.N. protection and had already repulsed an effort to take Kidal.

He said the U.N. mission was failing to protect civilians in northern towns occupied by the militia and the Malian army, including Menaka and Anefis.

Neighboring Niger had been due to host talks from Wednesday to ease tensions but government sources in Niamey said the discussions were canceled after representatives of the armed groups failed to show up, citing the latest violence.

Mali says it has asked the African Union and the United Nations to investigate the ceasefire violations. MINUSMA on Monday threatened to apply targeted sanctions against those found to be behind the violence.

The West African nation is seeking to break a decades-long cycle of Tuareg uprisings, the most recent of which allowed Islamist groups, some linked to al Qaeda, to seize the desert north in 2012.

A French-led intervention a year later scattered the Islamists but failed to eradicate them, and Islamist violence is once more on the rise, spreading further south.

Mali Expresses Reservation Over MINUSMA’s Safe Zone Around Kidal
Star Africa
August 19, 2015

The Malian government expressed hesitation about the decision by the UN Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) to create a safe zone around Kidal, noting that it rather preferred MINUSMA “remains in its role of protection of the population and of all people, in all exposed areas, like Kidal, at the same security threats”.

Choguel Maiga, government spokesman is quoted by statement read on Tuesday evening on national television, as saying that “any unfair treatment will produce negative risk to the search for peace and harmony”.

MINUSMA has since Monday decided to set up a safety zone around Kidal city “to protect the civilian population”.

Since Saturday, the Kidal region has been experiencing renewed violence marked in particular by deadly clashes between the Coordination of Azawad Movements (CMA) and Gatia, a pro-government militia.

EUROPE

The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, War Crimes Chamber

Official Website [English translation]

Second-Instance Verdict Sent Out in the Case of Predrag Milisavljević et al.
Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina
August 7, 2015

On July 23, 2015, the Appellate Division Panel of Section I for War Crimes of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina sent out the second-instance verdict of June 2, 2015 in the case of Predrag Milisavljević et al., which, in their entirety, refused as ill-founded the appeals filed by the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina and by defense counsel for the accused Predrag Milisavljević, from the verdict issued by the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina No. S1 1 K 011128 12 Krl of October 28, 2014, whereas the appeal filed by defense counsel for the accused Miloš Pantelić was partly granted, so the verdict issued by the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina No. S1 1 K 011128 12 Krl was modified in the decision on punishment in the manner that the accused Miloš Pantelić, concerning the criminal offense of Crimes against Humanity, is now sentenced to 15 (fifteen) years of imprisonment. The first-instance verdict was upheld in the remaining part.

The first-instance verdict of the Court of BiH found the accused Predrag Milisavljević and Miloš Pantelić guilty that by the actions described in Section 1 of the Operative Part of the Verdict they committed the criminal offense of Crimes against Humanity under Article 172(1)h) as read with Subparagraph a) of the CC BiH, all in conjunction with Article 29 of the CC BiH, for which they were sentenced to 20 (twenty) years of imprisonment each. Pursuant to Article 56 of the CC BiH, the time the accused spent in custody was credited towards the sentence of imprisonment.

The verdict acquitted the accused Predrag Milisavljević, Miloš Pantelić and Ljubomir Tasić of the charges that, under Article 284, Subparagraph c), of the CPC BiH, by their actions under individual counts of the indictment they committed the criminal offense of Crimes against Humanity.

The Prosecutor filed an appeal because of the erroneously established state of facts in relation to the acquittal, specifically in relation to the accused Miloš Pantelić for the actions described in Sections 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 of the Operative Part of the Verdict, and in relation to the accused Predrag Milisavljević and Ljubomir Tasić for the actions described in Section 8 of the Operative Part of the Verdict. The Prosecutor’s Office filed its appeal because of the sentencing decision in relation to the accused Predrag Milisavljević and Miloš Pantelić, proposing that the appellate panel grant the appeal, revoke the challenged verdict in the foregoing section and order a retrial, or modify the challenged verdict concerning the conviction, by imposing on the accused Predrag Milisavljević and Miloš Pantelić a heavier sentence.

Defense counsel for the accused Predrag Milisavljević filed his appeal because of the essential violation of criminal procedure provisions, violations of criminal code, erroneously and incompletely established facts and the sentencing decision, as well as property claim, moving the appellate panel to grant the appeal and modify the first-instance verdict in terms of conviction, and acquit the accused Milisavljević of the charges concerning the criminal offense of Crimes against Humanity under Article 172(1)h) as read with Subparagraph a) of the CC BiH, all in conjunction with Article 29 of the CC BiH, or to revoke the first-instance verdict and order a retrial, and issue a decision to terminate custody of the accused Milisavljević.

Defense counsel for the Miloš Pantelić filed his appeal because of the essential violation of criminal procedure provisions and the erroneously and incompletely established state of facts, moving the appellate panel to revoke the challenged verdict and hold a retrial, with a reproduction of the already adduced evidence by re-examining certain witnesses, and after that render an acquittal.

On June 2, 2015, the Appellate Panel held a public session at which the parties orally presented the grounds for appeal, while maintaining their written submissions and arguments.

Having reviewed the challenged verdict within the bounds set in the appeal, the Appellate Panel issued the foregoing decision.

Milun Kornjača Sentenced to 7 Years of Imprisonment
Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina
August 7, 2015

Following a public trial held before the Appellate Division Panel of Section I for War Crimes of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, on August 6, 2015 the Appellate Panel publicly pronounced the second-instance verdict, finding the accused Milun Kornjača guilty of the criminal offense of Crimes against Humanity under Article 172(1)(h) (Persecution), as read with Subparagraph (e) of the Criminal Code of Bosnia and Herzegovina, all in conjunction with Article 180(1) of the CC BiH and Article 29 of the same Code.

In that regard, the Court sentenced the accused Milun Kornjača to 5 (five) years of imprisonment. Taking into account the previously imposed sentence of imprisonment of 5 (five) years for the committed criminal offense of Crimes against Humanity by Persecution under Article 172(1)h) of the CC BiH as read with Article 180(1) of the CC BiH and Article 29 of the CC BiH, under the verdict of the Court of BiH No. S 1 1 K 003541 10 Kri of May 21, 2014, upheld in its convicting part by the Appellate Panel’s verdict No. S1 1 K 003541 14 Krž 12 of March 10, 2015, the Court ultimately imposed on the accused Milun Kornjača a single sentence of 7 (seven) years of imprisonment.

Pursuant to Article 56 of the CC BiH, the time the accused Milun Kornjača spent in custody shall be credited towards his sentence of imprisonment.

Pursuant to Article 188(4) of the Criminal Procedure Code of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the accused Milun Kornjača is relieved of the obligation to reimburse the costs of the criminal proceedings, which will be covered from within the Court’s budget appropriations.

The accused Milun Kornjača was found guilty because during the period from mid-April 1992 to late May 1992, in the Čajniče municipality, within a widespread and systematic attack of the Serb Municipality of Čajniče TO, members of the Plavi orlovi (Blue Eagles) unit and the Čajniče police station officers, helped by paramilitary formations coming from Serbia and Montenegro, directed against the non-Serb civilians in the Čajniče municipality, knowing of such an attack, as Commander of the Plavi orlovi unit he ordered and himself perpetrated the persecution of non-Serb civilians in the Čajniče municipality on ethnic and religious grounds, by detention committed with the intention to inflict immense suffering or serious physical or mental injury or health violation. The accused Milun Kornjača is acquitted of the charges that, even though after the murder of detained persons he learned from those present on the premises of the Čajniče TO Headquarters that a certain member of the Plavi orlovi unit had committed the killing of detained persons at the Lovački dom na Mostini (Hunting Lodge), he took no action that might have been expected from him in line with his rights and duties as Commander of the Plavi orlovi unit to punish the person who killed the detained persons.

The Court also issued a decision that the prohibitive measures, previously imposed on the accused Milun Kornjača, and extended by Court’s Decision No. S1 1 K 003541 10 Kr1 of May 21, 2014, shall remain in force until the accused is committed to serve his sentence of imprisonment.

The Suspect Mato Baotić ordered into Custody
Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina
August 13, 2015

Deciding upon a Motion filed by the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina issued, on August 12, 2015, a decision granting the Prosecution’s Motion and ordering the suspect Mato Baotić into one-month custody. Pursuant to the referenced decision, custody may last up until September 10, 2015, or until a new decision of the Court.

Having reviewed the presented evidentiary materials, the Court concluded there is a grounded suspicion that the Suspect committed the criminal offense as charged, and ordered the Suspect into custody as there are circumstances pointing to a risk of flight, and a justified fear indicating that, if released, the Suspect will hinder the criminal proceedings by influencing the witnesses.

Mato Baotić is suspected of having committed the criminal offense of War Crimes against Civilians in violation of Article 173(1)(e) of the Criminal Code of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Indictment Confirmed in Ivan Kraljević et al. Case
Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina
August 14, 2015

On August 6, 2015, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina confirmed the Indictment charging the Accused Ivan Kraljević, Mate Jelčić, Slavko Skender, Stojan Odak, Nedjeljko Matić and Vice Bebek with the criminal offense of Crimes against Humanity and the criminal offense of War Crimes against Prisoners of War, and charging the Accused Vinko Radišić and Dragan Miloš with the criminal offense of War Crimes against Prisoners of War.

The Indictment alleges that, in the period from late April 1993 to late March 1994, in the Military Investigation Prison in Ljubuški, as part of a widespread and systematic attack of the HVO and the Military Police of the HVO against the Bosniak civilian population and prisoners of war from the Municipalities of Stolac, Čapljina, Mostar, Prozor, Livno and Jablanica, and Municipalities of Maglaj and Žepče in Bosnia, knowing of the attack and that with their act or omission they participated in it, Ivan Kraljević, Mate Jelčić and Slavko Skender, who each carried out the duty of the warden of Ljubuški Military Investigation Prison in different periods, and Stojan Odak, Nedjeljko Matić, Vice Bebek, Vinko Radišić and Dragan Miloš, as members of the HVO Military Police and guards of the Ljubuški Military Investigation Prison, knowingly participated in a Joint Criminal Enterprise with the common plan of enhancing and implementing the system of detention and abuse.

International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY)

Official Website of the ICTY

Karamarko says Serbian Policy Based on Myths and Half-Truths
dalje
August 5, 2015

The Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) leader Tomislav Karamarko said on Wednesday in Knin that August 5 1995 was one of the greatest days in Croatia’s history and dismissed Serbia’s criticism which he said was based on the policy fostered by myths, half-truths and untruths.

As for Serbian comments on the exodus of the Serbs from Croatia, there are relevant documents, proving that the departure of the Serbs from Croatia was planned by the team led by (Serbian leader Slobodan) Milosevic while Croatia’s President Franjo Tudjman called on the Serbs to remain in Croatia, Karamarko said.

“Their criticism is their business and also a regretful thing. It’s high time they addressed their own past and I would like see them say something about a Greater Serbia idea which Milosevic intended to implement,” the Croatian Opposition leader said.

Karamarko recalled that Operation Storm put an end to the implementation of that idea.

The implementation began exactly in Knin in 1990 with the establishment of a quasi-state “Serb Krajina” that had terrorised the Croatian people for five years, the HDZ leader added.

Thousands flocked in Knin for central celebrations of Croatia’s Victory Day observed on August 5, in memory of Operation Storm and the liberation of that southern Croatian town on August 5 1995.

Serbia’s Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic said on Tuesday that Croatia should be ashamed of “Storm” and that Serbia would no longer be silent about that offensive which it perceived as “a horrible crime”.

Addressing a commemoration held in the northern town of Sremska Raca in memory of Serbs killed and expelled from Croatia, Vucic said that August 5, 1995 was one of the saddest days in the recent Serbian history.

Operation Storm was launched at 5am on August 4, 1995, and within the following 84 hours 10,400 square kilometres or 18.4 per cent of Croatia’s territory was liberated. A 20-metre-long Croatian flag was displayed on the fortress in Knin, the heart of the Serb rebellion, at noon on August 5.

About 200,000 soldiers and police took part in the biggest operation of the Homeland War, of whom nearly 200 were killed and over 1,400 wounded.

Operation Storm marked the end of the war in Croatia, created conditions for the peaceful reintegration of the eastern Danube River region, spared the northwestern Bosnian town of Bihac from the fate of Srebrenica, and enabled the return of refugees and displaced persons.

The legitimacy of Operation Storm has been proved before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. On November 16, 2012, the Appeals Chamber reversed the Trial Chamber’s convictions of General Ante Gotovina, commander of the Split Military District, and General Mladen Markac, special police commander, and ordered their immediate release. The generals were in the ICTY’s custody on charges of involvement in a joint criminal enterprise and excessive shelling of Knin, Gracac, Obrovac and Benkovac.

Bosnian Serb Forces Not Behind Wartime Mosque Destruction – Witness
Institute for War & Peace Reporting
By Daniella Peled
August 14, 2015

Engineer tells court that demolitions were carried out in a haphazard rather than systematic way.

A defence witness for former Bosnian Serb army chief Ratko Mladic told Hague judges this week that the wartime destruction of mosques was due to collateral damage or plain vandalism, and was not part of a deliberate policy.

Dragic Gojkovic, a former engineer with the Bosnian Serb army (VRS), authored a report in which he concluded that army units under Mladic’s command were not involved in the destruction of buildings outside active combat zones.

The defence had enlisted Gojkovic to contest the findings of prosecution witness Andras Riedlmayer, an expert on Islamic architecture, who testified two years ago about the numerous mosques and Catholic churches destroyed during the conflict.

Mladic, commander of the Bosnian Serb army from 1992 to 1996, is charged with the “destruction of cultural monuments and sacred sites” in relation to 11 Bosnian municipalities.

Prosecutors allege that Mladic is responsible for crimes of genocide, persecution, extermination, murder and forcible transfer which “contributed to achieving the objective of the permanent removal of Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats from Bosnian Serb-claimed territory”. He is accused of planning and overseeing the 44-month siege of Sarajevo that left nearly 12,000 people dead, as well as the massacre of more than 7,000 men and boys at Srebrenica in July 1995.

At the start of his testimony, Gojkovic made clear that his own expert report was based on the one that Riedlmayer submitted to the tribunal.

He complained that he had only been given seven hours to complete the “huge task” of writing his report, but that he had studied Riedlmayer’s data “very carefully”.

However, Gojkovic said that after he examined the most “characteristic” examples of the 94 buildings cited in Riedlmayer’s report, it was clear that their destruction had not been carried out by experts.

“I looked at their demolition, which was done in what I would describe as a criminal way without any particular model, system or method,” he said.

The commonest demolition method was to target the minaret, he said, which did not make structural sense.

“In most cases when mosques in BiH [Bosnia and Herzegovina] were demolished, it was minarets that were attacked first and foremost, and too much explosive was being used – enough to destroy the entire building,” he said. “Now it depended on where the explosives were placed. A minaret would fall either on the building itself or to the side. Secondly, in most cases when minarets were destroyed, the roofs were damaged too. Also in many cases, after the building was destroyed, it was also torched; or rather it is very difficult to ascertain whether buildings were burned before or after the demolition.

“At any rate, explosives were placed inside the minaret and at the level of the roof – if I can put it that way – so that the explosives would usually damage the roof or blow it away, and then due to the weather conditions, rain, snow etc, you don’t know what was destroyed by explosions and what was due to the passage of time and the weather conditions. On the basis of photographs only, it is hard to establish that.”

Prosecuting lawyer Arthur Traldi focused his cross-examination on undermining the witness’s entire report. He noted that although Gojkovic testified that there was a great deal of information missing from Riedlmayer’s report, he had not included any additional information in his own study.

“I only dealt with the way in which buildings were demolished. Riedlmayer dealt with spirituality, history and whatever else,” Gojkovic replied.

Traldi asked him to point out one new piece of information in his report that had not been in Riedlmayer’s document. The witness was unable to do so.

Traldi then turned to the witness’s contention that ten mosques were destroyed during combat, while 84 were destroyed after the Bosnian Serb army withdrew from the area in queston.

He accused Gojkovic of presenting the trial chamber with a “false dichotomy” by excluding information showing that some buildings were destroyed after the fighting was over but at a time when “the VRS maintained clear control of the area”.

The witness repeated that he had only used the information contained in Riedlmayer’s report.

The prosecution said it was unacceptable that he had no other supporting evidence.

“You have offered the trial chamber, in the body of your report, unsupported conclusions which you do not explain and which, you now testify, you do not know whether they are true or not,” Traldi said.

The witness acknowledged that he may have “made some errors” but maintained that his data was “90 per cent correct”.

Traldi turned to specific examples of destroyed mosques, including in Novoseoci in the Sokolac municipality and Sanica in Kljuc.

He noted that in Novoseoci, the trial had heard evidence that the village had been “cleansed” and that “the male residents were massacred”.

“Did you consider evidence like that in determining whether to list something as during combat operations or after ‘withdrawal’?” he asked.

Gojkovic repeated that he had only drawn on the evidence set out in the prosecution report and had “looked at the techniques, the manner and proportions of the building, the manner in which the building was demolished”.

He added that throughout the war, the Bosnian Serb army would have remained in liberated areas for between five and ten days before handing over to the civilian authorities.

Once again, Traldi asked how the witness had been able to judge whether the army had withdrawn or not.

Turning to the example of the Sanica mosque, destroyed on June 26, 1992, Traldi asked, “Did you consider the Sanica mosque as having been destroyed during combat operations or after VRS withdrawal?”

The witness was unable to answer.

“What I’m putting to you, sir, is that [in] coming to this conclusion you have essentially made numbers up,” the prosecutor said. “You have no basis for it, and you are providing the trial chamber information that you have no basis for providing. That’s the truth right?”

The witness denied this.

Traldi now turned to the conclusion which Gojkovic drew in his report that “the destruction of these cultural sites was an uncontrolled spate, not part of the chain of command”.

“So just to make sure I understand your evidence, it’s your evidence that violence committed against every Muslim and Croat cultural site that either you or Mr. Riedlmayer looked at in these 12 different municipalities – different areas of Bosnia at different times – was either some sort of grassroots movement of people desecrating mosques and churches or a coincidence,” Traldi said. “Is that right?”

“Precisely,” the witness responded.

The prosecutor asked whether Gojkovic had studied any of the comments that wartime Serb leaders had made regarding mosques and churches.

The witness said he personally believed there was no need to do so, but that he had spoken to Dragan Davidovic, the Republika Srpska (RS) minister for religious affairs, at the end of the war.

“He claimed to me that the leaders of the Bosnian Serbs did not take part in this [destruction]”, Gojkovic said, adding that Davidovic had also publicly condemned the “criminal” 1993 demolition of the Ferhadija mosque in Banja Luka.

Traldi then read from an article which appeared in the New York Times on August 21, 1992 and which included a quote from Simo Drljaca, the then chief of police in Prijedor.

Drljaca was shot dead in 1997 during an attempt to arrest him for war crimes.

“‘With their mosques, you must not just break the minarets, you’ve got to shake up the foundations because that means they cannot build another. Do that and they’ll want to go, they’ll just leave themselves,'” Tradli quoted Drljaca as saying. “This is not the sort of statement that you would have considered in coming to your conclusion that the Bosnian Serb authorities were disconnected from the destruction of mosques, is it?” he asked.

The witness said that Drljaca “was certainly an extremist” but that his comments did not represent the views of all RS leaders.

Traldi put it to the witness that he had in fact “failed to consider statements by actual authorities, and relied on one conversation you had with a gentleman named Davidovic in coming to this conclusion”.

The witness denied this, going on to emphasise that Bosnian Muslims and Croats had also served under him in the VRS, and that he and his commanders had “never dreamed” of demolishing cultural or religious sites.

“Do you think that I as commander would be destroying the buildings of soldiers who are waging war together with me? Does that seem logical to you?” he asked.

The trial will continue with the testimony of Mladic’s wife, Bosiljka Mladic.

Mile Mrksic Dies in Detention
inSerbia
August 17, 2015

Former commander of the Republic of Serb Krajina Army general major Mile Mrksic died in the detention facilities in Portugal where he was serving the sentence pursuant to the ICTY ruling, Radio Television of Serbia reported.

Mrksic’s daughter Marija said in the letter for the media that her father was transferred to the prison hospital ward on July 22 due to poor health and that the doctors diagnosed him with lung cancer.

Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Rasim Ljajic announced on Saturday that he will ask for immediate release for treatment in Serbia in case of Mile Mrksic, who was transferred to the Lisbon prison in 2012.

ICTY sentenced Mrksic and several more Serbs in 1995 for mass murder of over 260 people at Ovcara in the vicinity of Vukovar. Mrksic willingly surrendered to the court on May 15, 2002.

The trial began in October 2005 and the ICTY Trial Chamber pronounced the verdict against Mrksic on September 27, 2007, sentencing him to 20 years of imprisonment for aiding and abetting torture, brutal treatment and murder of 194 Croatian inmates at a farm in Ovcara on November 20, 1991.

Domestic Prosecutions In The Former Yugoslavia

David Schwendiman chief prosecutor of special court for KLA war crimes
InSerbia News
By TANJUG, Kosovapres
August 10, 2015

US lawyer David Schwendiman will be the chief prosecutor of the new special war crimes court for members of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), Pristina-based news agency Kosovapres reported.

As of August 2014, Schwendiman has been the lead prosecutor of the European Union’s Special Investigative Task Force on Kosovo, whose mandate is to conduct an independent criminal investigation into the war crime and organized crime allegations contained in the CoE report of January 2011 by Senator Dick Marty, he has excellent knowledge of the crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia, and he has also participated in war crimes investigations in many world areas, the agency said.

From 2006 to 2009, Prosecutor Schwendiman served as an international prosecutor in the Special Department for War Crimes of the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH). In this role, he investigated and prosecuted war crimes committed during the 1992-95 conflict. From late 2007 until the end of 2009, he was one of four Deputy Chief Prosecutors of BiH and oversaw the Special Department for War Crimes.

Kosovo Serb Leader Hospitalized Due to Hunger Strike
Yahoo News
August 15, 2015

A top Kosovo Serb politician detained over suspected war crimes against ethnic Albanians has been hospitalized after his health deteriorated from a hunger strike, a medical official said Saturday.

Oliver Ivanovic, who is being tried by an EU tribunal in northern Kosovo for war crimes allegedly committed in 1999-2000, began a hunger strike on August 7 to protest against the court’s decision to extend his detention. He has been held since his arrest in January 2014, and the court has rejected his request for release several times.

“His life is not endangered at this moment, but his health has deteriorated over the hunger strike and he is refusing to receive” treatment, Milan Jakovljevic, head of the medical team that admitted Ivanovic to hospital, told reporters.

“It is necessary to keep him in the hospital” for the time being, he said.

Last week the EU court rejected Ivanovic’s latest request for a provisional release, despite the Serbian government’s guarantees that Ivanovic would be reachable and stand trial.

Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic called the court’s decision “senseless” and it was “aimed at further humiliation of Kosovo Serbs”.

The 62-year-old Ivanovic, who is considered a political moderate, is the first senior Kosovo Serb official to be charged and tried by the European Union Rule of Law Mission (EULEX) on suspicion of war crimes against ethnic Albanians.

Ivanovic, a former Serbian secretary for Kosovo, pleaded not guilty in August 2014 at the start of his trial, which is due to resume on September 10.

After the 1998-1999 Kosovo war, Ivanovic became a key interlocutor with NATO, the UN and later the EU and was seen as backing dialogue with the Kosovo Albanian community.

However, he was also among the organisers of a now-disbanded Kosovo Serb group of vigilantes known as “Bridgewatchers”, whose members were suspected of taking part in violence against ethnic Albanians.

Some 120,000 ethnic Serbs live in Kosovo, which declared independence from Serbia in 2008 and has about 1.8 million inhabitants, most of them ethnic Albanians.

Kosovo has been recognised by more than 100 countries, including the United States and a majority of the EU states.

NGO in Serbia Files War Crimes Charges Against Policemen Over Slaughter of Albanian Women and Children
dtt-net
August 17, 2015

An Belgrade NGO has raised war crimes charges against two members of two wartime Serb policemen over slaughter of 53 Albanian civilians (24 women and 23 children) during the 1998-1999 war in central Kosovo.

The Humanitarian Law Center (FHP) said it filed charges on Monday against two unidentified former policemen for the crime in the village of Old Poklek (alb. Pokleku i Vjetër), Gllogovc municipality on 17th of April 1999.

The NGO said the suspects were members of the 86th Detachment of the Special Police Unit of Serbia’s Interior Ministry. Two of its commander are also charged but “of not preventing the crime and not punishing the perpetrators.”

“…one of the police officers smashed the window of the room where the women, children and the elderly were, opened the door violently and threw a bomb into the room, which exploded immediately. After several minutes, the same police officer came into the room to check whether there were any survivors. He instantly killed the ones who were still alive, using an automatic rifle,” the NGO wrote in a statement.

“After having killed almost all the civilians in the house, the police officers took two cans of petrol and burned the room where the bodies of the killed civilians were. Four persons, among them a child of two, who had survived the bombs and shooting but had not left the room on time, were burned alive,” it wrote, explaining that most of the children were less then seven years old.

The youngest baby killed was 10 month-old. Three persons survived and the remains of three others are still missing.

Convicted Serb War Criminal Mrksic Dies
Yahoo News
By AFP
August 18, 2015

A former Serb army commander serving a 20-year sentence for his role in the massacre of Croats during the Balkans wars has died in Lisbon at the age of 68, the Portuguese government said Tuesday.

Mile Mrksic, a former officer in the Yugoslav army (JNA), was convicted in 2007 by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for aiding and abetting the torture and murder of nearly 200 civilians in Vukovar in eastern Croatia in 1991.

His sentence by The Hague-based UN court was upheld on appeal in 2009, and he was transferred in 2012 to a high security prison in Lisbon.

Mrksic died on Sunday of a terminal illness in a hospital in the Portuguese capital, a justice ministry spokesman told AFP, without elaborating.

The capture of Vukovar by the Yugoslav army and Serb rebels in 1991 is considered a pivotal event at the outbreak of Croatia’s 1991-95 war of independence.

The town was razed and more than 1,000 civilians were killed during the three-month siege and its aftermath, while some 22,000 non-Serbs were expelled.

Mrksic was convicted over the killing of 194 people who had been forcibly taken from a hsopital where thousands of Croats and other non-Serbs had taken refuge.

Mrksic’s subordinate Veselin Slijivancanin, was sentenced by the ICTY to 10 years in prison for his role in the massacre, while a third defendant was acquitted.

About 20,000 people were killed in the war sparked by Croatia’s proclamation of independence from the former Yugoslavia.

Vt. Man Faces War Crimes Retrial
The Rutland Herald
August 19, 2015

A Vermont man is expected to face a second trial early next year on charges he lied about his role in Bosnian war crimes during the early 1990s.

Earlier this summer, the conviction of Edin Sakoc was overturned after a judge ruled prosecutors made comments during his January trial that had not been included in the original indictment.

The Burlington Free Press reported that during a Monday hearing in federal court in Burlington attorneys said they would like to hold the retrial in February or March.

Sakoc is a Bosnian Muslim who arrived in the United States in 2001. Prosecutors charged he lied on his 2007 citizenship application about his role in war crimes in 1992, which his attorneys argued were committed by a Bosnian army commander.

MIDDLE EAST AND ASIA

Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC)
Official Website of the United Nations Assistance to the Khmer Rouge Trials (UNAKRT)

One-time supervisor tells of work on dam
Phnom Penh Post
By Rebecca Moss
August 11, 2015

During the final stretch of construction on the Trapeang Thma Dam in 1977, on sweltering April days just before Khmer New Year, workers carried earth in shifts for 120 hours straight with only brief breaks, witness Kan Thorl told the Khmer Rouge tribunal yesterday.

Thorl, now 57, worked as deputy platoon chief at the worksite, supervising 30 workers, though he recalled 15,000 people labouring at the dam, which he said was completed in under three months – although other witness testimonies dispute this timeframe. “At night, there were militiamen, they would monitor our movement,” he said.

To encourage the dam’s rapid progress, Thorl added that near-daily sessions for “self-criticism” and “re-education” were held, with the inefficient or those who feigned illness deprived a portion of their food rations – three cans of rice a day for a good worker.

According to the witness, between two and five members of his unit fell sick each day and less than 30 per cent were able to make their daily work quota.

“They became weaker and weaker after the food ration had been reduced,” he said. “This was one kind of punishment imposed on us.”

The witness confirmed that these instructions were handed down by Ta Val, who oversaw the worksite; he also placed several other senior cadre members at the dam, including sector secretary Heng Rin, and Ta Cheal, a member of the sector committee.

Thorl confirmed that the control of the dam switched into the hands of Southwest Zone cadres in 1977 – “Those from the Northwest Zone were no longer there,” he said simply – but could not say how he knew this, and denied arrests occurred at the site.

In an attempt to jog his memory, however, the prosecution read a passage from Thorl’s witness statement to the investigating judges.

“One day, I saw that they had arrested people and tied them up and were walking them nearby my building during the night.

I did not know their names.

The people walking them were dressed in black and had guns slung over their shoulders so I assumed they were soldiers,” the statement read.

The proceedings concluded with the discussion of marriage at the dam worksite, an arrangement of 30 couples wed at once with minimal ceremony.

Thorl said couples chose their partners willingly, contradicting previous testimony from civil parties, and said the regime believed traditional ceremonies were excessive and that marriages only required a “resolution” between partners as they held each other’s arms.

Ex-cadre tells of dam purges
The Phnom Penh Post
By Alessandro Sassoon
August 12, 2015

A former Khmer Rouge soldier and Trapeang Thma Dam guard between 1976 to 1977, Lat Suoy began his testimony by recounting the day the Khmer Rouge entered his village near the dam, on April 17, 1975.

“They came and screamed for all the relatives of Lon Nol soldiers, to take them away and execute them,” he said.

“They arrested my village chief Nea Rim and his wife and they were executed”, he added.

The recollection prompted an objection from the defence, who maintained that the alleged purges did not figure into the scope of the current Case 002/02.

However, the objection was ultimately overruled on the grounds that the purges established the existence of Khmer Rouge policy implemented nationally.

Suoy himself feared his relatives might be targeted as intellectuals by initial purges as “they had studied to grade one or two”.

Drafted into the ranks of the regime at age 15, Suoy said he did not know what the army was.

Taken into the jungle and separated from his parents, he “cried often”.

Speaking of his time at the Trapeang Thma Dam, Suoy testified that Ta Val commanded all mobile work units in sector five.

The witness claimed he knew Ta Val well, saying, “Ta Val was a very firm person”, and that “every time Ta Val came by, everyone feared him and tried to work harder”.

According to Suoy, subordinates carried out arrests at the worksite but the orders for executions came from Ta Val.

Suoy then described sanitary conditions, how workers had swollen bodies and would be poisoned from resorting to eating plants and mushrooms. “Some had knees bigger than their heads.”

At the end of the session, Suoy confirmed the purge of Northwest Zone cadres by Southwest Zone cadres in 1977, in which he himself eventually became a target. “Southwest Zone cadres came to arrest Northwest Zone cadres,” Suoy continued, naming Ta Val among the victims of the purge.

Once his superior was arrested, Suoy was next, but he evaded capture.

“I fled to my house and the Southwest cadres arrested me . . . I used Khmer traditional martial arts to knock down the security guard and fled”.

The day’s session ended with Suoy explaining how the purge continued, “They accused my village of being traitors. They intended to arrest all of us.

We had to take refuge in the jungle”.

In the morning, witness Kan Thorl concluded his testimony, saying he had heard secondhand accounts that any Vietnamese people found were to be executed, an element of the genocide charges in Case 002/02.

KR Leaders had authority over killings : Witness
Cambodian Daily
By George Wright
August 14, 2015

A former assistant to the head of the Trapeang Thma Dam worksite during the Pol Pot regime told the Khmer Rouge tribunal Thursday of an order stipulating that the decision to kill could only be made by the party’s leadership.

Chhit Yoeuk, who served under Ta Val—a ruthless commander witnesses say was responsible for ordering executions at the Banteay Meanchey worksite—told the court of a 1978 meeting in which mobile unit chiefs informed their subordinates they could not carry out purges.

“On the issues of arrests or killings, only in 1978 I heard of the meeting by the chiefs of the mobile unit who said that lower cadre did not have the authority to kill anyone, and only the decision to kill someone could be made by the center,” he said.

When asked by Judge Jean-Marc Lavergne if lower-level cadre held autonomy over purges prior to 1978, Mr. Yoeuk said he believed the directive could have come as a result of such a practice.

“It might be possible that those cadre made their own decisions to kill people and that’s why later on there was a directive from the center prohibiting them to kill in 1978,” he said.

Mr. Yoeuk was also questioned on his demotion from Ta Val’s assistant to collecting fertilizer at the site, and why he did not refuse to accept his new role.

“I didn’t know what mistake I made and I was reassigned to carry fertilizer…. I thought maybe someone made an accusation against me that’s why I was reassigned,” he said.

Despite regularly deflecting questions related to deaths at the site, claiming he was unaware of killings due to his low rank, Mr. Yoeuk admitted that he was afraid of losing his life.

“The fear was that I was wondering if someone made an accusation against me, if that was the case I would be in a big, risky situation that I might be arrested and sent to be killed,” he said.

“People disappeared without any reason and in fact during the regime, nobody dared ask any questions about this issue. For example if I was to be taken away, that’s the end of the story, nobody would dare to ask why I was being taken away,” he said.

More EU Financial Assistance to ECCC and Genocide Education
Khmer Times
August 15, 2015

The European Union has decided to make an extra contribution amounting to 10 million euro to support the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) as well as to support genocide education in Cambodia.

According to a press release of the European Union Delegation to Cambodia made public Friday afternoon, 8.9 million euro of the total fund will be used to support the international and national components of the ECCC in order to ensure the necessary international standards of justice for the hybrid tribunal.

The rest (1.1 million euro) will be used to provide genocide education as a means encouraging and reinforcing collective and individual historical memory as well as understanding the importance of respecting human rights and cultural diversity, it pointed out.

“This new contribution to the ECCC is a renewed proof of the commitment of the European Union to improve good governance and the rule of law in Cambodia as well as to raise standards in the administration of justice and in combating impunity in this country,” said Mrs. Fiona Ramsey, Chargé d’Affaires a.i. of the Delegation of the European Union to Cambodia.

The EU contribution will be managed by the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) in close partnership with the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), said the press release.

With this new contribution, it added, the EU support to the ECCC now totals more than 17.3 million euro over the past 9 years (since 2007). To date, the EU and the EU Member States have contributed to the Court approximately US$55 million, corresponding to 26 percent of the total contributions. This makes the EU and the EU Member States combined the second largest contributor to the Court.

Iraq

Grotian Moment: The International War Crimes Trial Blog

Iraqi panel wants Maliki to ‘face court over fall of Mosul’ to IS group
France24
August 16, 2015

An Iraqi parliamentary panel called Sunday for dozens of security and political officials, including former prime minister Nuri al-Maliki, to be indicted in connection with the fall of the northern city of Mosul to Islamic State (IS) group.

The indictment of Maliki, who remains a powerful figure in Iraq’s complex political landscape, and other senior officials comes a week after Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi launched a sweeping campaign to combat corruption and mismanagement that he argued had made the country nearly impossible to govern.

In the panel’s report, seen by Reuters and confirmed as accurate by three of its members, the committee also placed responsibility for the June 2014 defeat with former Mosul Governor Atheel al-Nujaifi, former acting defence minister Sadoun al-Dulaimi, former army chief General Babakir Zebari and Lieutenant General Mahdi al-Gharrawi, former operational commander of Nineveh province, of which Mosul is the capital.

Others accused include Nineveh police commander Major General Khalid Hamdani and former Deputy Interior Minister Adnan al-Assadi. “No one is above the law”

There has been no official accounting of how Mosul was lost, and who gave the order to abandon the fight. The fall of the city – Iraq’s second-largest – was a turning point in Islamic State’s seizure of large swathes of the country’s north and west in a sweep across the Syrian border last year.

An investigation by Reuters in October showed how troop shortages in Mosul and infighting among top officers and Iraqi political leaders played into Islamic State’s hands and fuelled panic that led to the city’s abandonment. Maliki has accused unnamed countries, commanders and rival politicians of plotting the fall of Mosul.

The parliamentary report was approved by 16 of the panel’s 24 members, lawmaker Muhsin Sadoun said. Panel member Mohammed al-Karabouli said parliament would vote on the report’s findings on Monday and then refer it to Abadi, the prosecutor general and the integrity commission.

“No one is above the law and accountability to the people,” said Parliament Speaker Saleem al-Jabouri in a statement upon receiving the report. “The judiciary will punish perpetrators and delinquents.”

Syria

Syria: War Crimes Amplify Suffering of Eastern Ghouta’s Bombed and Besieged Civilians
Amnesty International
August 12, 2015

Relentless aerial bombardment and shelling by Syrian government forces is magnifying the suffering of civilians trapped under siege and facing an escalating humanitarian crisis in Eastern Ghouta, said Amnesty International in a new report published today.

‘Left to die under siege’: War crimes and human rights abuses in Eastern Ghouta, Syria reveals damning evidence of war crimes and describes the Syrian government’s siege on Eastern Ghouta and unlawful killing of its besieged civilians, occurring as part of a widespread as well as systematic attack on the civilian population, as amounting to crimes against humanity. The report also highlights the agonizing struggle to survive of more than 163,000 people living under siege in Eastern Ghouta, as well as exposing abuses by non-state armed groups in the area.

“For nearly three years the lives of civilians in Eastern Ghouta have been devastated by bloodshed and tragedy. They are trapped and surrounded by fighting on all fronts with no means to escape the unlawful aerial and shelling attacks waged by government forces. Their anguish is compounded by dwindling supplies of food, clean water and other crucial necessities which mean that daily life for many has become a prolonged experience of hardship and suffering,” said Said Boumedouha, Acting Director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Programme.

War crimes by government forces

Between January and June 2015 Syrian government forces carried out at least 60 aerial attacks on Eastern Ghouta killing around 500 civilians. The report documents 13 air strikes and other attacks amounting to war crimes, which killed 231 civilians and only three fighters. In 10 cases no military target could be identified in the vicinity suggesting the strikes were direct attacks on civilians or at best indiscriminate. In the remaining three cases the attacks appeared grossly disproportionate or otherwise indiscriminate. Many public places that were struck were crammed full of civilians including a crowded public market, a school while students were nearby and the vicinity of a mosque soon after Friday prayers.

Satellite imagery analysis shows that aerial attacks carried out between 28 December and 10 February have completely destroyed multiple residential buildings in the vicinity of Taha mosque in Douma. One eyewitness said that he saw nine bodies scattered on the streets near the mosque killed by an airstrike on 9 February. He added that residential buildings, an underground field hospital and a school were also destroyed.

On the same day, Amir witnessed another strike on another mosque in Douma. He described to Amnesty International how displaced families including children were killed in the attack that struck al-Ansar mosque in Douma where they had sought refuge. “Nowhere is safe,” he said.

Public markets are also on the list of Syrian government’s targets. “It was a disaster,” one eyewitness said describing the aftermath of the attack on the market in Kafr Batna on 5 February. Residents said the attack took place at 1pm– the “busiest hour of the day” – and also destroyed two nearby residential buildings. There was no trace of a military target nearby.

In a similarly shocking attack on 25 January Syrian air force jets bombed a market in Hamouria shortly after Friday prayers as crowds of people poured out of a nearby mosque to buy sugar sold that day at a discounted price, killing more than 40 civilians. “I could only see blood. It was horrific, like nothing I have seen before,” an eyewitness said. “The timing and location of these attacks appear deliberately orchestrated to maximize damage or civilian casualties in a gruesome attempt by the Syrian government forces to terrorize the population. All attacks on civilians and civilian buildings or infrastructure must end,” said Said Boumedouha.

Syrian government forces also repeatedly fired imprecise rockets and mortars or unguided bombs into populated areas in a series of direct and indiscriminate attacks on civilians amounting to war crimes.

“By repeatedly bombing heavily populated areas in a series of direct, indiscriminate and disproportionate attacks as well as by unlawfully besieging civilians, Syrian government forces have committed war crimes and displayed a sinister callousness towards Eastern Ghouta’s civilians,” said Said Boumedouha.

Life under siege – a struggle to survive

In addition to daily bombardments, living conditions for civilians of Eastern Ghouta have continued to deteriorate. Residents have limited access to food, clean water or medical care and essential supplies including electricity and fuel. Checkpoints controlled either by government forces or armed groups restrict their movements into and out of Eastern Ghouta. Government forces have also denied UN agencies and other humanitarian actors free access to the area.

More than 200 people have died from starvation or lack of access to adequate medical care in Eastern Ghouta between 21 October 2012 and 31 January 2015 according to the Syrian American Medical Society.

An emerging black market “war economy” has seen smugglers and members of armed groups or government officials profit at the expense of civilians. Syrian government forces routinely confiscate food at checkpoints forcing residents to buy goods on the black market often for up to 10 times the price of goods in central Damascus.

Marwan, a local resident from Jesrine, said he had lost more than 15kg in weight because of the siege. He spent days without eating in order to ensure his four children and wife could eat once a day. “What will it take for the United Nations to do something about it? Is starvation the only answer?” he said.

“Government forces are using starvation as a weapon of war in flagrant violation of international law. Withholding food and basic supplies required to survive is a vicious act of cruelty amounting to collective punishment of the civilian population,” said Said Boumedouha.

Residents also said Army of Islam (Jaysh al Islam) fighters and their families had abundant food while civilians were forced to pay hugely inflated prices.

The report discloses that non-state armed groups, particularly the Army of Islam, are guilty of an array of abuses including abductions, arbitrary detentions and indiscriminate shelling. Their use of imprecise weapons such as mortars and Grad rockets in populated areas amounts to war crimes.

“Widespread violations by the Syrian government do not excuse the appalling behaviour of the Army of Islam who have also waged indiscriminate attacks, failed to protect civilians and deprived them of access to food or medical care. Civilians of Eastern Ghouta are essentially caught in between two hostile sides vying for their own gain,” said Said Boumedouha.

International action desperately needed

More than a year ago the UN Security Council adopted two resolutions intended to alleviate the suffering of Syria’s civilians, calling on all parties to the conflict to end attacks on civilians, lift all sieges, grant unfettered humanitarian access and release anyone arbitrarily detained. So far however, they have failed to assuage the suffering of most civilians.

“The aim of these resolutions was precisely to protect civilians and prevent a full scale humanitarian disaster. Yet so far the UN Security Council has looked on as the resolutions continue to be openly flouted and the crisis grows steadily worse, despite commitments to take further steps to ensure they are enforced. Such steps are desperately overdue,” said Said Boumedouha.

“Perpetrators of the crimes under international law that we are witnessing in Syria must no longer be allowed to escape justice. As long as Russia blocks the Security Council from referring the situation in Syria to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, justice remains a distant prospect.”

So far the UN Security Council has looked on as the resolutions continue to be openly flouted and the crisis grows steadily worse, despite commitments to take further steps to ensure they are enforced. Such steps are desperately overdue

The Security Council must urgently impose targeted sanctions against all parties to the conflict in Syria responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity as well as an arms embargo on the Syrian government. The Syrian government should ensure unfettered access for the Independent International Commission of Inquiry to the country as well as other human rights monitors including Amnesty International.

UN Humanitarian Chief Says He is ‘Horrified’ by Attacks on Civilians in Syria
Associated Press
By Albert Aji and Bassem Mroue
August 17, 2015

The United Nations humanitarian chief said on Monday he is “horrified” by the attacks on civilians taking place in Syria, singling out in particular government airstrikes the previous day that killed nearly 100 people in a Damascus suburb.

The protracted conflict not only “severely affects” the lives of millions of people in Syria but also threatens the stability of the entire region, Stephen O’Brien said at a press conference in Damascus.

The stark warning comes amid a surge in violence as Syrian government troops, Islamic militants and rebels carried out attacks that killed and wounded dozens Monday, including in President Bashar Assad’s coastal stronghold of Latakia.

“Attacks on civilians are unlawful, unacceptable and must stop,” O’Brien said, speaking at the end of a three-day visit to Syria, during which he met senior officials and visited the central province of Homs.

Government air raids on Sunday killed at least 96 people in the eastern Damascus suburb of Douma, making it one of the deadliest single incidents since the crisis began in March 2011. The airstrikes hit a vegetable market in the suburb, which is a stronghold of the Islam Army rebel group.

Syria’s conflict has killed more than 250,000 people, according to United Nations.

“I am particularly appalled by reports of airstrikes yesterday, causing scores of civilian deaths and hundreds injured, right in the center of Douma,” O’Brien said. “I am horrified by the total disrespect for civilian life in this conflict.” He

appealed to all parties to protect civilians and respect international humanitarian law, and also expressed concerns for 4.6 million Syrian “stuck in hard-to-reach and besieged areas.”

O’Brien also lambasted armed groups for cutting off water in Damascus, saying it was unacceptable to “use access to water and other services as a weapon of war.”

Water cuts have been used before in the Syrian civil war, with Damascus and the northern city of Aleppo, Syria’s largest city and former commercial center, most affected.

In Washington, State Department spokesman John Kirby said the United States “condemns in the strongest possible terms the Assad regime’s deadly airstrikes” on the Douma market.

“The Assad regime’s brutal attacks on Syria’s cities have killed thousands of people and destroyed schools, mosques, markets, and hospitals,” Kirby said, adding that they “demonstrate the regime’s disregard for human life.”

U.N. special envoy Staffan de Mistura also condemned the Douma airstrikes.

“Hitting crowded civilian markets (and) killing almost one hundred of its own citizens by a government is unacceptable in any circumstances,” de Mistura said, repeating calls for the warring sides to urgently start a dialogue toward a political solution.

Also Monday, the rebels in Damascus’ wider eastern suburbs — an area known as Eastern Ghouta — imposed a curfew, fearing more government airstrikes and saying the curfew was imposed out of concern for civilian lives. The rebel statement said the curfew would go on until further notice. Douma is part of Eastern Ghouta.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported 22 air raids on Eastern Ghouta on Monday, including seven in Douma. The Local Coordination Committees said Douma was hit with mortar shells.

Douma-based activist Baraa Abdul-Rahman said the streets there were empty and most people were staying indoors. “There is a situation of terror and fear in the town,” he said via Skype.

In Turkey, the head of the main Western-backed opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, blasted the government over Douma’s air raids and urged the international community to help bring officials behind the “massacres and war crimes” to the International Criminal Court.

Sweden grants temporary asylum to 40 war crimes suspects
Middle East Monitor
August 14, 2015

A report by the Swedish Migration Agency has revealed that the government in the Scandinavian country has granted temporary residence to 40 asylum seekers who are suspected of having committed war crimes in Syria and Iraq. The suspects do not want to return home as they fear that they will be killed if they do.

Asylum expert Magnus Bengtsson noted that although war crimes suspects who seek asylum come to Sweden using false identities, the Swedish authorities have uncovered their real identities after thorough investigations. He pointed out that the people in question have not been sent back to their country because they risk getting killed or tortured, and “some” have been given temporary residence permits.

In a related matter, Swedish state television has claimed that hospitals in Sweden have treated 301 citizens who were injured in Syria and Iraq after joining the ranks of Al-Nusra Front and Daesh.

ISIS Beheads 82-Year-Old Archaeologist in Palmyra, Syrian Official Says
Fox News
August 19, 2015

ISIS militants have beheaded an 82-year-old archaeologist who had been in charge of overseeing the ancient site at Palmyra in Syria, a government official said Tuesday.

Syrian state antiquities chief Maamoun Abdulkarim told Reuters that the family of Khaled Asaad had informed Abdulkarim that Asaad had been beheaded earlier in the day and his body hanged from a column in the town’s main square.

Asaad’s death was also reported by the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The Observatory, which has a network of activists on the ground in Syria, said dozens of people gathered to witness the killing.

Abdulkarim said that Asaad had been held and interrogated by members of the terror group for over a month before his death. The official said that Asaad’s captors had been looking for information about where the town’s treasures had been hidden to save them from ISIS, but they had no success getting the information from the scholar.

ISIS seized Palmyra, whose Roman-era ruins attracted thousands of tourists prior to Syria’s civil war, from government forces in May. In the days and weeks before the city fell, Syrian officials said they had moved hundreds of statues out of concern that they would be destroyed by ISIS fighters.

“Just imagine that such a scholar who gave such memorable services to the place and to history would be beheaded … and his corpse still hanging from one of the ancient columns in the center of a square in Palmyra,” Abdulkarim said. “The continued presence of these criminals in this city is a curse and bad omen on (Palmyra) and every column and every archaeological piece in it.”

Asaad spent over 50 years working at the UNESCO World Heritage site, including alongside U.S., French, German, and Swiss archaeological missions. He also wrote many books and scientific texts either individually or in cooperation with other Syrian or foreign archeologists, SANA said. Among his titles are “The Palmyra Sculptures,” and “Zenobia, the Queen of Palmyra and the Orient.”

Abdulkarim described Asaad as “one of the most important pioneers in Syrian archaeology in the 20th century.” The country’s official news agency SANA reported that Asaad had been in charge of Palmyra’s archaeological site for four decades until 2003, when he retired. After retiring, al-Asaad worked as an expert with the Antiquities and Museums Department.

Asaad, who held a diploma in history and education from the University of Damascus, also discovered several ancient cemeteries, caves and the Byzantine cemetery in the garden of the Museum of Palmyra, the agency reported.

“Al-Asaad was a treasure for Syria and the world,” Khalil Hariri from Palmyra’s archaeological department told The Associated Press, speaking over the phone from the central Syrian city of Homs.

“Why did they kill him?”

“Their systematic campaign seeks to take us back into pre-history,” he added. “But they will not succeed.”

ISIS drew international condemnation after it released videos showing members destroying artifacts with hammers and drills in a museum in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul and using explosives to wreck other sites.

In March, ISIS members in Iraq razed 3,000-year old Nimrod and bulldozed 2,000-year old Hatra — both UNESCO world heritage sites. At the time, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon described the action as a “war crime.”

However, it is not completely clear what ISIS has done with Palmyra’s Roman-era ruins. In June, ISIS blew up two shrines that did not date from Roman times, but were regarded by the militants as pagan and sacrilegious under their strict interpretation of Islam. One of the destroyed tombs belonged to a descendant of the Muslim prophet Muhammad’s cousin. ISIS also destroyed a lion statue in the town dating back to the 2nd century. The statue, discovered in 1975, had stood at the gates of the town museum, and had been placed inside a metal box to protect it from damage.

In early July, ISIS released a video showing the killing of some 20 captured government soldiers in Palmyra’s amphitheater. They were shot dead by young IS members, armed with pistols. Hundreds of people were seen watching the killings.

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

New Jersey Man Charged With Plotting to Support ISIS
The New York Times
By Stephanie Clifford
August 10, 2015

A New Jersey man who prosecutors said tried to organize support for the Islamic State was arrested on Monday.

The man, Nader Saadeh, 20, wanted to “form a small army” that would include his friends, according to the United States attorney for New Jersey. Mr. Saadeh lived in Rutherford, N.J., until he left the United States in May but was detained in Jordan.

Mr. Saadeh was charged with conspiracy and seeking to provide material support to a terrorist group.

A person who knew Mr. Saadeh alerted the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Joint Terrorism Task Force, the criminal complaint says, telling federal agents in April that the men were headed overseas to join the Islamic State, which is also known as ISIS or ISIL.

That person lived with Mr. Saadeh and his brother, Alaa, 23, for several years after their parents were deported. The brothers lived together in Fort Lee, N.J., from 2012 to 2014, and this year moved back in with the same person in Rutherford.

The person said Nader Saadeh began to change after he moved in, “praying five times a day” and wearing “traditional Muslim attire in place of the Western clothing he had previously worn,” the criminal complaint says. He also became agitated when the conversation was not about Islam, the complaint says. When the Islamic State burned alive a Jordanian pilot, Mr. Saadeh said it was justified, according to the person, and he also said the attack on the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo was justified.

By April, the person said, Mr. Saadeh changed his phone number and began speaking in Arabic, which was not his first language, rather than English, when they were together.

Federal authorities then searched Mr. Saadeh’s email and social media accounts and found messages supporting the Islamic State.

In messages from 2013, Mr. Saadeh and a friend discussed building a “small army” of their friends. “Think of it, it will probably be like 2-4 yrs from now, we will be in the prime of our lives,” he wrote.

By April, Mr. Saadeh’s mother expressed worry. He received two messages through his mother’s friends dissuading him from joining the Islamic State. His mother wrote him, “Do not go anywhere if u love me dont kill your mom.”

In May, after Mr. Saadeh discussed joining the Islamic State with his brother and two friends, he flew from Kennedy International Airport to Amman, Jordan. About 10 days after he arrived, his father alerted Alaa Saadeh that his brother had been detained there, according to the person who lived with the brothers.

Nader Saadeh appeared in Federal District Court in Newark on Monday afternoon. His lawyer declined to comment.

His brother was arrested in June. The two friends who discussed joining the Islamic State — Samuel Rahamin Topaz, 21, of Fort Lee and a 20-year-old Queens resident who was not named — were also arrested that month.

Alaa Saadeh consented to being jailed without trying for bail, court records show, and is in plea negotiations. No bail package was presented for Mr. Topaz, who is also in plea negotiations.

California Man Guilty of Trying to Support Islamic State
The New York Times
By The Associated Press
August 10, 2015

A California college student who lied on a passport application so he could travel to Syria and join the Islamic State pleaded guilty Monday to a terrorism-related charge.

Adam Dandach, 21, of Orange pleaded guilty to attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State and to lying on a passport application.

He acknowledged in a plea agreement filed in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana that he supported violent jihad against the “occupiers” of Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria and planned to offer his services to the terrorism cause.

On July 2, 2014, the day he attempted to fly to Istanbul, he emailed a friend and complained that more people weren’t helping the cause and that it was a “golden opportunity,” according to court documents.

FBI agents found his smartphone loaded with jihadi songs supporting Islamic State fighting, maps of areas the group controlled, and Twitter updates of fighting by the terrorist group.

He told FBI agents who questioned him at John Wayne Airport that he was heading to Syria and planned to pledge allegiance and offer assistance to the Islamic State. He said he believed the killings of American soldiers were justified.

Dandach was initially snared on a charge of lying to get a replacement passport when he claimed on an application that he accidentally tossed out his old passport. He knew his mother confiscated his passport when she learned of his travel plans, prosecutors said.

His mother, Sawsan Ghannoum, told The Associated Press in March that she hid the passport when her son said he wanted to visit his father in Lebanon and volunteer for charity work.

She said he had psychological problems and was naive and misled by people on the Internet while trying to learn about Islam.

“He’s not a kind of violent person, a terrorist,” Ghannoum said. “He’s afraid of a bee.”

Dandach could face up to 25 years in federal prison when sentenced Jan. 11.

His lawyer did not immediately reply to a message seeking comment.

2 NYC students charged with conspiring to provide material support to ISIS
PIX11 News
By Alyssa Zauderer
August 11, 2015

A federal grand jury has indicted two New York City college students on terror charges accusing them of attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State and carry out a terror attack.

Munther Omar Saleh, 20, and Fareed Mumuni, 21, have been in custody since June.

Prosecutors say the 21-year-old Saleh had researched recipes for homemade explosives and looked up city landmarks on the Internet. They also say he and the 20-year-old Mumuni discussed how to build a pressure cooker bomb.

On June 13, Saleh and another man were arrested in Queens after they approached a police officer while armed with knives.

Just a few days later, the FBI executed a search warrant on Mumuni’s home on Staten Island. During the search, Mumuni allegedly tried to stab an FBI special agent with a large kitchen knife. Officials said the attack was premeditated.

“He kept the knife he used to attack the FBI Special Agent wrapped in a T-shirt in his bed for such an occasion,” the court document said. “Mumuni also stated that he kept the knife that was recovered from his mother’s vehicle for use in an encounter with law enforcement.”

Police Commissioner Bill Bratton commended the agents and detectives from the Manhattan-based Joint Terrorism Task Force and prosecutors on the case.

“Stabbing an FBI agent and providing ‎material support to a designated terrorist organization are a recipe for indictment, as alleged,” said Bratton.

Their defense attorneys haven’t responded to messages seeking comment on the indictment. An attorney previously denied Mumuni is an Islamic State convert and said he has a clean record.

An arraignment is set for Aug. 20.

Mumuni faces up to 85 years in prison while Saleh faces a maximum sentence of 65 years.

Man Pleads Not Guilty to Backpack Bomb Plot on Florida Beach
The New York Times
By The Associated Press
August 11, 2015

A Florida Keys man pleaded not guilty Tuesday to federal charges of plotting to set off a backpack bomb on a beach to show solidarity with the Islamic State militant group.

Attorney Richard Della Fera entered the plea Tuesday in federal court in Miami for 23-year-old Harlem Suarez of Key West, who did not speak during the brief hearing. Suarez faces life in prison if convicted of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction and up to 20 years behind bars if found guilty of seeking to provide material support to terrorists.

Della Fera says Suarez, who emigrated from Cuba with his family in 2004, is no terrorist and has portrayed him as “troubled and confused.” The case, which involved FBI use of undercover operatives, evolved from a series of pro-Islamic State postings on Suarez’s Facebook pages earlier this year.

Suarez sometimes used a Facebook account with the name “Almlak Benitez” in which he appeared to be trying to recruit fighters for the terror group, the FBI says.

“We are the islamic state. We are isis Muslims,” one posting says.

According to the FBI, Suarez told an informant he wanted to detonate a homemade bomb using a backpack filled with nails on a Key West beach after previously discussing plans to set off a bomb in Miami Beach or another Keys town. He was arrested in July after officials say he took possession of an inert explosive device from an undercover FBI employee posing as an Islamic State member.

The material support charge stems from an Islamic State recruitment video Suarez is accused of making — using a script he wrote — with the assistance of the FBI informant, Della Fera said.

“Destroy our enemies against us. Let live only who are our brothers and sisters,” Suarez says on the video, according to an FBI complaint. “American soil is the past, we will destroy America and divide it in two, we will raise our black flag on top of your White House and any president on duty (cut head).”

Suarez is being held without bail in an isolation section of Miami’s downtown detention center reserved for terrorist suspects, alleged senior-level drug traffickers and similar high-profile defendants. Della Fera said he will decide whether to seek Suarez’s release on bail after reviewing the government’s evidence.

“Without any evidence, you’re just fishing around in the dark,” he said. “I haven’t received anything of substance in this case yet.”

A trial date has not yet been set.

Brooklyn Man Accused of Supporting ISIS Pleads Guilty
The New York Times
By Stephanie Clifford
August 14, 2015

A Brooklyn man accused this year of trying to join the Islamic State pleaded guilty on Friday to conspiring to provide material support to the terrorist organization.

Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev, 25, who appeared in Federal District Court in Brooklyn, will face a maximum possible term of 15 years in prison when he is sentenced. The date for the sentencing has not been set.

Mr. Juraboev is the first of a group of five co-defendants to plead guilty. In February, federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York said that Mr. Juraboev, an Uzbek citizen who worked in a Brooklyn gyro shop, had planned to fly to Istanbul, then travel to Syria, to fight for the Islamic State. Mr. Juraboev had a ticket to fly out of Kennedy International Airport to Istanbul departing in March, but was arrested before he could use it.

A co-defendant, Akhror Saidakhmetov, 19 at the time of his arrest and a citizen of Kazakhstan, was arrested in February on a jetway at Kennedy as he boarded a flight to Istanbul. The authorities said he had planned to slip into Syria from there and join the Islamic State, which is also known as ISIS or ISIL.

Mr. Juraboev and Mr. Saidakhmetov had talked of violence on behalf of the Islamic State, like planting a bomb in Coney Island and attacking President Obama, the authorities said. The authorities presented no evidence that the men had taken steps beyond just talk on those fronts. Mr. Saidakhmetov and three other remaining co-defendants have pleaded not guilty.

Prosecutors said three other men, Abror Habibov, Dilkhayot Kasimov and Akmal Zakirov, helped raise money to send fighters, including Mr. Saidakhmetov, to join the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL.

The criminal complaint against the men suggests investigators began monitoring Mr. Juraboev after he posted an online message asking how to martyr himself while staying in the United States. Federal agents interviewed him soon afterward, and he told them that he supported the Islamic State and that his friend, Mr. Saidakhmetov, shared similar views, according to the complaint. A paid informer soon began interacting with the two men and talking to them about traveling to Syria.

A lawyer for Mr. Juraboev did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“This case is another example of the reach that ISIL has within the United States through social media, and the fact that some are willing to follow that call,” William J. Bratton, the New York City police commissioner, said in a statement.

Young Mississippi Couple Linked to ISIS, Perplexing All
The New York Times
By Richard Fausset
August 14, 2014

She was a cheerleader, an honor student, the daughter of a police officer and a member of the high school homecoming court who wanted to be a doctor.

He was a quiet but easygoing psychology student. His father is a well-known Muslim patriarch here, whose personable air and habit of sharing food with friends and strangers made him seem like a walking advertisement for Islam as a religion of tolerance and peace.

Today, the young woman, Jaelyn Young, 19, and the young man, her fiancé, Muhammad Dakhlalla, 22, are in federal custody, arrested on suspicion of trying to travel from Mississippi to Syria to join the Islamic State.

Friends and strangers alike said it was difficult to imagine two less likely candidates for the growing roster of young, aspiring American jihadists.

“Something must have happened to her,” Elizabeth Treloar, 18, said of Ms. Young, her friend. “She’s too levelheaded, too smart to do this.”

Mr. Dakhlalla’s relatives were as shocked as anyone when he and Ms. Young were arrested last weekend on their way to a small regional airport, where they had intended to catch the first in a series of flights that would eventually put them in Istanbul. The only plans the family knew of, said Dennis Harmon, a lawyer and friend of Mr. Dakhlalla’s parents, were that he would attend graduate school in the fall here at Mississippi State University.

Ms. Young, who three years ago was broadcasting silly jokes on Twitter and singing the praises of the R&B singer Miguel, had more recently professed a desire to join the Islamic State, according to an F.B.I. agent’s affidavit in support of a criminal complaint. On July 17, the day after a young Muslim man in Chattanooga, Tenn., fatally shot five United States servicemen, Ms. Young rejoiced, the affidavit alleges, in an online message to an F.B.I. agent posing as a supporter of the Islamic State.

“Alhamdulillah,” she wrote, using the Arabic word of praise to God, “the numbers of supporters are growing.”

Though a number of young Muslims in the United States have been seduced in recent months by the Islamic State, the fact that it has resonated as far as Starkville has set off an understandable wave of distress here — a feeling that the struggle and terror in foreign deserts are not as far from the American heartland as they might have seemed.

Starkville, which calls itself “Mississippi’s college town,” tends to dent the national consciousness only when Mississippi State’s football team is winning. Both of the suspects attended Mississippi State: Mr. Dakhlalla graduated in May with a psychology degree and had been accepted to graduate school for the fall; Ms. Young hoped to become a doctor and held a research job in a chemistry lab on campus.

Theirs were rather emblematic Mississippi State stories: Though the sprawling land-grant college lacks the Old South mystique of its rival, the University of Mississippi, it has a multicultural campus thick with research scientists and engineers, and locals tend to be proud of Starkville’s relative tolerance. In Mississippi, said Nick Crews, 34, a musician and neighbor of the Dakhlallas, Starkville “is like this little bastion unto itself.”

And so, in addition to expressing fear and anger, many here were simply baffled by what had gone wrong with this handsome young couple who seemed to be on their way to sharing a 21st-century Mississippi success story.

Mr. Dakhlalla’s father, Oda Dakhlalla, arrived in Mississippi decades ago and studied civil engineering at the University of Mississippi, said Mr. Harmon, the lawyer and family friend. Mr. Dakhlalla’s wife, Lisa, is from New Jersey and is a Muslim convert, Mr. Harmon said. They raised three sons in Starkville, were deeply ingrained in the life of the town and were hard to miss. Oda Dakhlalla dresses in a traditional gown, and his reputation as a miracle-working math tutor earned him, among students, the nickname “Yoda.” Ms. Dakhlalla was known as “the hummus lady” for the Mediterranean specialties she sold at the local farmers’ market.

From 2005 to 2009, the family operated Shaherazad’s, a Middle Eastern cafe. Ms. Dakhlalla has said they got out of the business because she was having health problems. Mr. Harmon said that their generosity may have gotten the better of them.

“They were great cooks, but they weren’t good business people,” he said. “Oda wants to feed everybody, but you’re supposed to sell it, not give it away.”

There was no question that the family had embraced the strategy, common in both the Middle East and the American South, of fellowship through food. Mayor Parker Wiseman said the elder Mr. Dakhlalla often came around City Hall with lunches for workers. Mr. Crews, the neighbor, said he had a leg of lamb that Mr. Dakhlalla had given him in his freezer. Though he was not the imam of the local mosque, the Islamic Center of Mississippi, Oda Dakhlalla lived across the street from it, sometimes delivered the Friday sermon and often invited neighbors like Mr. Crews to services.

Muhammad Dakhlalla, the youngest of the couple’s three sons, goes by “Mo.” He worked at the restaurant, earned black belts in taekwondo and judo at a martial arts school, and attended Starkville High School.

R. J. Morgan, a former teacher, said Mr. Dakhlalla was bright, courteous and popular, and mixed easily with non-Muslim students.

When his world history class took a month to explore the Israeli-Palestinian crisis in depth, Mr. Morgan said, Mr. Dakhlalla, then a 10th grader, spoke in favor of Palestinian rights. “But in no way, in no way, did Muhammad have extreme views on the plight of the Palestinian people,” he said.

Mr. Dakhlalla met Ms. Young about a year ago, Mr. Harmon said. She had graduated near the top of her class at Warren Central High School, where she had been a member of the homecoming court. Marneicha Wilson, 19, an old friend, said Ms. Young had been raised in a Christian household and attended church, but had not been particularly zealous.

Ms. Treloar said Ms. Young had converted to Islam in April after being introduced to the religion by college friends. She recalled that Ms. Young was drawn to the Quran’s teachings because she believed it had been unchanged since it was first written. She thought the Bible, by contrast, had been translated so much that its original meaning was lost, Ms. Treloar said.

Ms. Young believed that Muslims and groups like the Islamic State had been unfairly caricatured in the West, Ms. Treloar said. But she saw no signs that Ms. Young would try to join the extremists.

Ms. Young’s last Facebook post, on March 17, was a jokey altered photo, a pop-culture riff involving Whoopi Goldberg, the Star Wars character Jar Jar Binks, and the rapper 2 Chainz. Two months later, the affidavit says, an F.B.I. employee identified her “through social media platforms” as a supporter of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL.

The court document describes how two F.B.I. employees, posing as supporters of the terrorist group, engaged the couple in a long online courtship in which they repeatedly stated their desire to join the militants. Ms. Young wrote that she might be able to offer “medical aid” to the cause. Mr. Dakhlalla wrote that he was “willing to fight.”

But their messages were full of concerns. Mr. Dakhlalla wondered if he would be placed with other English-speaking recruits. Ms. Young was frustrated that family and community members in Starkville did not support the Islamic State. She also confessed that she had never traveled outside the United States. “I need help crossing from Turkey to Syria with my hijjrah partner,” Ms. Young wrote in early June, using the Arabic word for “emigration” or “journey.”

Ms. Young said they would leave under the pretense of being “newlyweds on our honeymoon.” On June 6, the couple performed an Islamic marriage ceremony. Mr. Harmon said that for the marriage to be valid under Islamic law, Ms. Young’s father was required to sign a contract. But the father, a police officer who friends say served in the United States military in Afghanistan, refused to do so.

After their arrest, the affidavit states, the couple confessed that they were on their way to join the Islamic State. On Tuesday, a federal magistrate in Oxford, Miss., ordered them held without bail, citing their methodical planning. They each face up to 20 years in prison on the charge of attempting and conspiring to knowingly provide material support and resources to a foreign terrorist organization.

When Mr. Crews, the Dakhlallas’ neighbor, noticed unmarked police cars choking the block last weekend, he immediately guessed that “some idiot redneck did something to the mosque.”

“I certainly didn’t think somebody got arrested for wanting to join ISIS,” he said. “That just wasn’t on my radar.”

Competency of Man Accused of Supporting Terrorism Questioned
The New York Times
By The Associated Press
August 17, 2015

The lawyer representing a New York man accused of making plans to join the Islamic State group in Syria said Monday he is concerned about the man’s mental competency and received a federal judge’s permission for an evaluation.

Attorney Jeremy Schwartz made the request as Arafat Nagi, 44, pleaded not guilty to a two-count indictment charging him with attempting to provide material support, resources and personnel — himself — to a terrorist organization.

The United States-born Nagi was planning his third trip to Turkey, with plans to continue to Syria to join the fighters, at the time of his arrest last month, federal prosecutors said. Investigators learned of Nagi’s activities after being tipped off by residents alarmed by his jihadi beliefs, which he espoused in person and on social media, according to a criminal complaint.

Schwartz, asked after the hearing about his request for a competency hearing, said: “There are certain communications that I have had that gave me those concerns, but I can’t specifically talk about the details.”

During the hearing, assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy Lynch said the government was “not aware of any issues” but did not oppose the request.

Nagi’s brother and adult son were in court but declined to comment afterward.

Between 2012 and the time of his arrest, Nagi, an unemployed and divorced father of two, bought combat gear, including a machete, night goggles and body armor, and pledged allegiance online to the Islamic State group, prosecutors said. He also posted photos of beheadings and severed heads in 2014 before flying to Turkey, where he stayed for 10 days before continuing on to Yemen for a month, the criminal complaint said.

He was planning another trip this month, authorities said.

“The anticipated August 2015 trip was, I think, the last decisive action by this defendant and once he made that decision, we decided it was appropriate to effectuate an arrest,” Lynch told reporters after the hearing.

He said the pre-trial discovery phase of the case would be complicated because it will likely involve classified information. The government also plans to pursue 14 warrants to search electronic devices seized from Nagi’s home in Lackawanna during a July 29 search, he said.

Nagi has been held without bail since his arrest.

Special Tribunal for Lebanon

Official Website of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon
In Focus: Special Tribunal for Lebanon (UN)

Expert Testifies at STL on Mobile Phone Network Data
The Daily Star
August 20, 2015

Expert witness John Edward Philips gave testimony to the Special Tribunal for Lebanon Wednesday detailing the technical aspects of mobile communications networks, expected to be the basis of the prosecution’s case.

His testimony is set to span the next two weeks, with a defense cross-examination expected to start next Monday.

Philips is an expert in the area of cell-site analysis specialized in analyzing data generated by 2G GSM systems in the U.K. His testimony builds on that provided by other expert witnesses last month about how the prosecution assembled call sequence records.

The call sequence tables and data records show who the alleged suspects in the trial were calling and from where, at given times. This data is an integral part of the prosecution’s case, as is Philip’s testimony about the inner workings of the system.

Philip’s used simulation cell-site data to explain the underlying features of the mobile network, drawing on existing systems in the U.K. as an example. At one point, Judge Walid Akoum asked Philip why he had not conducted a field study in Beirut at the site of the 2005 suicide bombing that killed former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Philips replied that it was up to the prosecution to determine whether he was required to do a field survey. “I think it was decided it wasn’t appropriate for me to,” he told the judge.

Bangladesh International Crimes Tribunal

Verdict Against Bagerhat Razakar Duo Tuesday
Dhaka Tribune
August 6, 2015

The International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) 1 has set Tuesday to pronounce judgement in the case against Bagerhat Razakar duo Sheikh Sirajul Haque alias Siraj Master and Khan Akram Hossain.

Justice M Enayetur Rahim, chairman of the three-member panel of ICT 1, passed the order ton Wednesday morning, reports BSS.

Abdul Latif Talukder, accomplice of Siraj and Akram and another accused in the case, died of old age complications on July 28 at Dhaka Medical College Hospital.

The first tribunal on June 23 kept the verdict waiting for any day as the prosecution and defence concluded their respective arguments on that day.

A total of 32 prosecution witnesses, including the investigation officer, testified against the trio, whereas five defence witnesses submitted their depositions in support of the accused.

The ICT 1 issued warrant to arrest them on June 10, 2014, and Latif was nabbed by police on that very day. Akram was arrested on June 20 and Siraj on July 21.

The ICT 1 on November 5, 2014, indicted the trio in seven specific charges of crimes against humanity.

Bangladesh Court Sentences 1 Man to Death, Another to Life in Prison for 1971 War Crimes
Minneapolis Star Tribune
August 11, 2015

A war crimes tribunal in Bangladesh sentenced one man to death and another to life in prison Tuesday for collaborating with Pakistan to commit mass killings and other crimes during the 1971 war for independence.

The head judge of a three-member panel, M. Enayetur Rahim, handed down the sentences to Sheikh Sirajul Islam and Khan Akram Hossain in a packed courtroom in Dhaka.

The men faced charges including killing up to 700 civilians in the southwestern district of Bagerhat during the war. They were also found guilty of killing up to 50 minority Hindus in one village in a separate incident.

Bangladesh says Pakistani soldiers, aided by local collaborators, killed 3 million people and raped 200,000 women during the nine-month war, which ended in December 1971.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina set up the tribunal in 2010 to punish the collaborators. At least 17 people, mostly from the opposition Jamaat-e-Islami party, have been sentenced to death or life in prison. Two senior party leaders have been executed.

Jamaat-e-Islami is the main partner of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party, which boycotted 2014 general elections and is headed by former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia — Hasina’s archrival.

Jamaat-e-Islami had openly campaigned against Bangladesh’s independence and formed militias to prevent it from breaking away from Pakistan.

War Crimes Investigation in Burma

United Nations Rights Envoy Says Meeting with Myanmar’s Rohingya Blocked
Daily News and Analysis
August 8, 2015

A UN human rights envoy says her whirlwind visit to Myanmar was marred by disappointments: She was barred from meeting long-persecuted Rohingya Muslims.

Talks with several high-ranking officials were denied or cancelled at the last minute. And when she met with government critics, security officials were there, quietly snapping pictures.

Yanghee Lee was in the Southeast Asian nation to assess the human rights situation ahead of general elections, the second vote since the former dictatorship began its bumpy transition to democracy just a few years ago.

But she said today the lack of access and serious disruptions to her program made it impossible to fulfill her mandate.

It was Lee’s third trip to Myanmar since being appointed the country’s UN special rapporteur on human rights just over a year ago. The challenges have increased with each visit. She has waded into sensitive subjects, most notably the treatment of the country’s 1.3 million Rohingya.

Though she asked to visit for 10 days, as she has in the past, she was only given five this time. “I am also disappointed that requested meetings and visits were not granted or suddenly changed or cancelled at the last minute without prior notice,” she said. Lee said she had received credible information that some of her interlocutors had been photographed by security officials. “I also heard that some individuals I met with in previous visits were monitored, photographed and later questioned,” she said.

During Lee’s last visit in January, comments about the persecution of Rohingya drew a stinging response from the government, which accused her of bias and infringing on state sovereignty. Though many members of the religious minority arrived generations ago, most people in this predominantly Buddhist nation of 50 million say all Rohingya are migrants from neighbouring Bangladesh.

Attacks by machete-wielding mobs in 2012 sent more than a quarter-million Rohingya either fleeing by boat or to camps in Rakhine state, where they have limited access to adequate health care or education and are denied freedom of movement.

Lee noted that Rohingya have been told they cannot vote in the November 8 polls, though many could in 2010. “This is an issue that must be seen against the backdrop of institutionalised discrimination against the Muslim population in Rakhine,” she told a press conference at the end of her visit.

The opposition, led by Aung San Suu Kyi, is expected to make substantial gains in upcoming polls at the expense of the military-backed ruling party.

Lee had many concerns ahead of the vote, including the disenfranchisement of large swathes of the population, the harassment and arrest of civil society activists, journalists and those exercising freedom of speech, and the risk that elections in conflict-riddled areas will be called off. “While I am fully aware of the complexities of the situation in Myanmar and the reform process. I cannot hold Myanmar to a lower standard,” she added.