International Justice/ICC: July/Aug ‘09

A recent IWPR report (ICC Seen as Struggling to Communicate) outlining shortfalls in the International Criminal Court’s, ICC, communications policy shed light on the important issue of how the court gets its message out to communities affected by grave war crimes, representatives of organisations working in the field said.

IWPR interviewed Congolese journalists, lawyers and civil society activists who said people on the ground have little idea about what is going on in The Hague. Journalists and lawyers are frustrated that they do not have enough information about the court, and are struggling to disseminate news to the general population.

International non-governmental organisations, NGOs, told IWPR that the report was a useful and informative tool for them, because it came from a neutral observer, as opposed to ideas from NGOs that are involved with advocacy work at the court.

“NGOs have views on what the ICC should be doing, and different NGOs may have different goals. This is why a journalistic organisation is in a better position to provide neutral information,” said Mariana Pena from The International Federation for Human Rights, FIDH.

“You went to the ICC and also to NGOs and interviewed different stakeholders. The article was written bearing in mind all the different comments made by the different actors with different positions. This material is a useful tool, coming from a neutral source, informing us about what the situation is.”

Chidi Anselm Odinkalu, from the Open Society Institute, said that, in his view, those who are committed to the work of the ICC need to monitor it closely, criticise it constructively and hold it accountable to its mandate.

“I see the article as one such effort to ensure that the ICC lives up to its roles. I do not think it's an accident that since that article my colleagues and I over here have received some outreach inquiries and communications from the court and court staff appear to have got a bit more serious in outreach visits to different locations in Africa.”

During one outreach effort in Abuja, Nigeria, in August, the ICC met legal representatives who may be interested in representing victims of an attack on an African Union base in Haskanita, Darfur, in September 2007. Nigerian peacekeepers were killed in the attack, and three Darfur rebels are wanted by the ICC as a result.

Odinkalu stressed that it is necessary to ensure the ICC communicates more clearly, routinely and effectively with both the media and actors on the ground.

“Those are probably the most effective mechanisms of outreach that the court has at its disposal given its resource constraints,” Odinkalu said.

The ICC has been working to ramp up its outreach activities, and has started a raft of new initiatives, such as a radio programme for victims in the Central African Republic, CAR, which borders the Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC.

Justice Richard Goldstone, former chief prosecutor for the Rwanda and Yugoslav war crimes tribunals, said the media is the most effective way of explaining what is happening in the court, and to counter negative rumours or misconceptions.

He warned that if the court does not engage with journalists and inform them about its work, it will lose an essential ally.

Goldstone said that constructive criticism is important, and that if the media does not report what criminal courts do, then they can only have a limited impact on society.

“This applies in greater force with international courts because of the distance between the court itself, and victims and interested parties on the ground. In this context, the media is the other side of the coin of justice,” he said.

The ICC is based in The Hague in The Netherlands, thousands of kilometres away from the countries it deals with: Uganda, the CAR and the DRC.

It has been working since 2002 to bring the worst perpetrators of the world’s most unthinkable crimes to justice, and so far, has been most active in the DRC, with four individuals in custody. One trial is ongoing, and two more are due to kick off in the coming months.

Investigators have started work in war-torn North Kivu province, an area beset by crimes of sexual violence, the recruitment of child soldiers and the illegal flow of weapons, but remain tight-lipped about progress.