Abstract
This chapter provides definitions of reparative and restorative justice and situates them in the context of the Rwandan genocide against the Tutsi. It provides an overview of global examples of reparative justice and programs of reparations implemented by various countries in response to mass human rights violations and mass atrocity such as Germany, Morocco, Argentina, and Chile. It discusses the vulnerability and human rights violations genocide survivors in Rwanda face today and in the 26 years since the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. It critically explores concepts such as retributive justice, reconciliation, and forgiveness from the perspective of genocide survivors and advances a theory of reparative justice that is survivor centered. It discusses the gap between UN proclamations calling for assistance to genocide survivors and the lack of respect and fulfillment of these proclamations by the UN, its agencies, and member states. It illustrates how the Trust Fund of the International Criminal Court provides a framework for reparative justice for survivors of egregious human rights abuses and mass atrocity.
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Notes
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Howard Zehr and Harry Mika, Fundamental Concepts of Restorative Justice www.cehd.umn.edu/ssw/rjp/resources/rj_dialogue_resources/RJ_Principles/Fundamental_Concepts_RJZehr_MIKA.pdf
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Zehr and Mika note 12: 53.
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‘17 Genocide Survivors Mysteriously Murdered in Rwanda’. Hirondelle News, https://www.justiceinfo.net/en/hirondelle-news/20521-en-en-040908-rwandasurvivors-ibuka-17-genocide-survivors-mysteriously-murdered-in-rwanda1132811328.html
Sarah Womack, ‘Gang Kills Rwandan Genocide Widow’ The Guardian May 15, 2008.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/may/15/rwanda
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/dec/18/rorycarroll
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- 15.
Daniel Sabiiti, The East African ‘Ibuka Raises Alarm Over Killing of Survivors’ April 18, 2014.
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Jennifer Melvin, ‘Reconstructing Rwanda: Balancing Human Rights and the Promotion of National Reconciliation’ (2010) International Journal of Human Rights 936.
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Brandon Hamber and Richard Wilson, ‘Symbolic Closure Through Memory, Reparation, and Revenge in Post-Conflict Societies’ (2002) Journal of Human Rights 35.
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Jean Hatzfeld, The Antelope’s Strategy, Living in Rwanda After Genocide (Picador 2010) 16.
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Bruce Baker, ‘He Must Buy What He Stole And Then We Forgive: Restorative Justice in Rwanda and Sierra Leone’ (2007) Acta Juridica
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Noam Schimmel, ‘A Safe Place to Call Home: Securing The Right of Rwandan Genocide Survivors to Resettlement Outside Rwanda’ (2010) The Journal of Humanitarian Assistance.
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John Carlin, ‘New Dawn in Rwanda As Nation Forgives’ The Guardian (2003).
- 22.
For additional commentary addressing these arguments see the essay by Rebecca Goldstein and other Jewish contributors to Simon Wiesenthal’s The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness (Schocken 1998).
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David M. Halbfinger, Isabel Kershner and Katie Rogers, ‘At Holocaust Memorial, A Survivor and Towering Moral Voice Says He Cannot Forgive’ The New York Times (2020).
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/23/world/middleeast/auschwitz-liberation-anniversary.html
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Mary Kayitesi Blewitt Restorative justice: Healing wounds and repairing lives exhibit. In Lecture on Forgiveness. [Online]. Extract available: http://survivors-fund.org.uk/blog/restorative-justice/
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For data and commentaries on trauma and resilience in Rwandan genocide survivors see the following studies and note that this is not exhaustive:
H Rieder H. & T Elbert, ‘Rwanda—lasting imprints of genocide: trauma, mental health and psychosocial conditions in survivors, former prisoners and their children’ (2013) Conflict and Health 7(1), 1–13.
AERG (Association des Etudiants et Eleves Rescapes du Genocide). (2012). The impact of legal and homeless problems on trauma: A case study of youth survivors of Genocide committed against Tutsi, member of AERG. Retrieved from http://www.aerg.org.rw/wpcontent/uploads/2013/10/AERG-Research-Report-final1.pdf
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Life after death: Rebuilding genocide survivors’ lives: Challenges and opportunities. Proceedings of the Kigali Conference, 25–30 November 2001.
Lindsey. Hilsum, L. (2014). Rwanda 20 years on: the tragic testimony of the children of rape. Observer, 7/8. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/08/rwanda-20-years-genocide-rape-children.
Human Rights Watch (1996). Shattered lives—Sexual violence during the Rwandan genocide. Retrieved from https://www.hrw.org/report/1996/09/24/shattered-lives/sexual-violence-during-rwandan-genocide-and-its-aftermath Human Rights Watch (2004).
Human Rights Watch (2004) Struggling to survive: Barriers to Justice for rape victims in Rwanda. Retrieved from http://www.hrw.org/reports/2004/rwanda0904/rwanda0904.pdf
National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda. (2008). Genocide survivors census report—2007. Retrieved from http://statistics.gov.rw/publication/genocide-survivors-census-report-2007
Nadja Jacob, Consequences of Traumatic Stress in Rwandan Genocide Survivors: Epidemiology, Psychotherapy, and Dissemination. January 2010.
S. Schall and T. Elbert; Ten Years After the Genocide: Trauma Confrontation and Posttraumatic Stress in Rwandan Adolescents. Available at:
Denise H Sandole and Carl Auerbach, ‘Dissociation and identity transformation in female survivors of the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda: a qualitative research study’ Journal of Trauma and Dissociation (2013).
Philomene Uwamaliya and Grahame Smith, ‘Rehabilitation for Survivors of the 1994 Genocide in Rwanda: What Are the Lessons Learned?’ Issues in Mental Health Nursing (2017).
- 26.
Pablo De Grieff, Editor, Handbook of Reparations (Oxford: 2006).
- 27.
Ibid. and Ruth Rubio-Marin, The Gender of Reparations: Unsettling Sexual Hierarchies while Redressing Human Rights Violations, (Cambridge University Press 2011).
- 28.
Julie Guillerot and Ruben Carranza (2009) Rabat Report: The Concept and Challenges of Collective Reparations (New York: International Center for Transitional Justice).[Online].Available: http://ictj.org/sites/default/files/ICTJ-Morocco-Reparations-Report-2009-English.pdf
- 29.
Ibid.
- 30.
Edelstein, Jayni. (1994) Rights, Reparations, and Reconciliation: Some Comparative Notes. Seminar Number 6. [Online]. Available: http://www.csvr.org.za/wits/papers/papedel.htm
- 31.
Ibid.
- 32.
Melissa Eddy, ‘For 60th Year Germany Honors Duty to Pay Holocaust Victims’ The New York Times November 17, 2012.
- 33.
Edelstein, Jayni. (1994) Rights, Reparations, and Reconciliation: Some Comparative Notes. Seminar Number 6. [Online]. Available: http://www.csvr.org.za/wits/papers/papedel.htm
- 34.
Irwin Molotsky. (1988, April 21) Senate votes to compensate Japanese-American internees. New York Times. [Online]. Available: http://www.nytimes.com/1988/04/21/us/senate-votes-tocompensate-japanese-american-internees.htm
- 35.
The content of portions of this chapter is drawn from an earlier publication of mine in the Journal of Human Rights, as noted in the acknowledgments. However, it has been edited, revised, and rewritten here, and is distinctive from the article from which it draws much of its substantive information and commentary.
Noam Schimmel. (2012) The Moral Case for Restorative Justice as the Corollary of the Responsibility to Protect: A Rwandan Case Study of the Insufficiency of Impact of Retributive Justice on the Rights and Well Being of Genocide Survivors. Journal of Human Rights 11, 161–188.
- 36.
UN Resolution 59/137, https://undocs.org/en/A/RES/59/137
- 37.
Fund for Survivors.
http://survivors-fund.org.uk/news/survivors-rights/fund-for-survivors
- 38.
UN Resolution 60/225, ‘Assistance to Survivors of the 1994 Genocide in Rwanda, particularly the orphans, widows and victims of sexual violence’.
- 39.
(SURF 2011: para. 10).
- 40.
See, for example, the following Security Council report and General Assembly resolution, http://www.securitycouncilreport.org/un-documents/sierra-leone/ and http://www.un.org/documents/ga/res/48/a48r143.htm on the former Yugoslavia
- 41.
UN General Assembly, 68th Session, Agenda Item 71. http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/68/497
- 42.
De Brouwer, Anne-Marie. Reparations to victims of sexual violence: Possibilities at the International Criminal Court and at the Trust Fund for victims and their families. (2007) Leiden Journal of International Law 20, 207–237.
- 43.
Ibid.
- 44.
Hassan Jallow. (2007, January 31) Justice after Genocide: The Challenges of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. Speech to the University of Lund in Stora Salen. [Online]. Available: http://www.radioupf.se/contents/Hassan%20B%20Jallow%20%20Justice%20after%20Genocide%20Jan%20-07%20Lund.pdf 6.
- 45.
Ibid.
- 46.
Ibid.
- 47.
Conor Mccarthy. Reparations under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and reparative justice theory (2009) The International Journal of Transitional Justice, 3, 253–271. 261.
- 48.
Ibid.
- 49.
Ibid.
- 50.
The Trust Fund for Victims, (2012d) What We Do. [Online]. Available: http://trustfundforvictims.org/what-we-do
- 51.
Ruth Rubio-Maren and Pablo de Greiff. Women and reparations. (2007) The International Journal of Transitional Justice, 1, 337.
- 52.
Carranza, Ruben The Right to Reparations in Situations of Poverty. ICTJ Briefing. [Online]. Available: http://ictj.org/sites/default/files/ICTJ-Global-Right-Reparation-2009-English.pdf
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Schimmel, N. (2020). Defining Reparative Justice and Global Examples of Its Implementation. In: Advancing International Human Rights Law Responsibilities of Development NGOs. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50270-6_2
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