It’s an unusually hot autumn in the plains of southern Turkey, where in some places nothing but wire fencing is all that separates this country from the chaos that has engulfed Syria over the last eight years.
Cotton, pistachio and olive trees grow on both sides of the border. But plumes of black smoke are only rising above towns on the Syrian side.
Continue reading...After the latest atrocity by pro-Turkey forces, the long era of impunity may be near an end
Actual or suspected war crimes have been reported at every stage of Syria’s long-running civil war – and Turkey’s latest cross-border incursion has unleashed another wave of atrocities, including executions of civilians and other alleged crimes against humanity.
But despite huge amounts of documentary evidence collected since 2011 by the UN and independent human rights groups, the perpetrators of such crimes in Syria, whether they are governments, armed factions or individuals, have mostly escaped punishment. This has encouraged a sense of impunity among wrongdoers – and dismay among victims.
Continue reading...Panel lists 160 key actors in Yemen war who could face charges, adding to pressure on UK to end Saudi arms sales
Britain, the US and France may be complicit in war crimes in Yemen by arming and providing support to a Saudi-led coalition that starves civilians as a war tactic, a United Nations report has said.
A UN panel of experts has for the first time compiled a list of 160 military officers and politicians who could face war crimes charges, including from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, the Houthi rebel movement and Yemeni government military forces. A secret list of those most likely to be complicit has been sent to the UN.
Continue reading...Murdered children are no longer news. International media coverage of the war in Afghanistan, where child deaths reached an all-time high last year, is sporadic at best. In Yemen it is estimated that at least 85,000 under-fives have died of starvation since 2015, a figure that numbs the mind. In Syria, especially, it is hard to keep count because children are being killed almost every day – and who is really counting?
Harrowing images briefly capture public attention. One of the more recent showed five-year-old Riham struggling amid the rubble of her bombed home in Ariha, in Syria’s north-western Idlib province, to save her baby sister, Tuqa. Riham died later in hospital along with her mother and another sister. Thanks to her efforts, and White Helmet rescuers, Tuqa survived.
Continue reading...Ramush Haradinaj agrees to appear at Serbia war crimes inquiry but not as leader
Kosovo’s prime minister has resigned after being invited for questioning by a Hague-based court investigating crimes against ethnic Serbs during and after the 1998-99 war.
Ramush Haradinaj said he had agreed to be interviewed at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers and Specialist Prosecutor’s Office next week and did not want to appear there as prime minister.
Continue reading...In 2015, the international community – led by the US and the UK – finally decided to take Bosco Ntaganda to the international criminal court to face justice for war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Ntaganda, known as “The Terminator”, became one of the most feared, powerful and brutal warlords in DRC since Rwanda, backed by Uganda, reinvaded DRC in 1998.
Related: DRC warlord 'the Terminator' convicted of war crimes
Continue reading...Washington also threatened economic sanctions if war crimes court goes ahead with inquiry into US troops in Afghanistan
The United States has announced it will revoke or deny visas to members of the International Criminal Court involved in investigating the actions of US troops in Afghanistan or other countries.
The US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, said Washington was prepared to take further steps, including economic sanctions, if the war crimes court goes ahead with any investigations of US or allied personnel.
Continue reading...The final unravelling of the Islamic State’s evil caliphate exerts a horrible fascination. The jihadis committed many appalling crimes in Syria and Iraq – exploiting the chaos caused by the Syrian civil war – and were responsible, directly or indirectly, for murderous attacks in Britain and several other European countries.
Most people expect a reckoning. It is only right that Isis fighters who have been captured alive, and those who gave them aid and succour, should face justice as soon as possible.
Continue reading...Inquiry accuses army of killing demonstrators ‘who were not posing an imminent threat’
UN investigators have accused Israeli soldiers of intentionally firing on civilians and said they may have committed war crimes in their lethal response to Palestinian demonstrations in Gaza.
The independent Commission of Inquiry, set up last year by the UN’s human rights council, said Israeli forces killed 189 people and shot more than 6,100 others with live ammunition near the fence that divides the two territories.
Continue reading...Report finds UK arms ‘highly likely to be cause of significant civilian casualties in Yemen’
The UK is on “the wrong side of the law” by sanctioning arms exports to Saudi Arabia for the war in Yemen and should suspend some of the export licences, an all-party Lords committee has said.
The report by the international relations select committee says ministers are not making independent checks to see if arms supplied by the UK are being used in breach of the law, but is instead relying on inadequate investigations by the Saudis, its allies in the war.
Continue reading...First former head of state ever to stand trial at the ICC spent seven years in custody in The Hague
The international criminal court has freed the former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo after his shock acquittal in January on charges of crimes against humanity.
Supporters sang and waved flags in The Hague after judges decided to release the 73-year-old on condition that he stays in an as-yet-unnamed country pending an appeal by the prosecution.
Continue reading...Special operations chief Edward Gallagher is also accused of shooting at unarmed Iraqi civilians at random
A decorated navy Seal has pleaded not guilty to charges of premeditated murder and other crimes in the stabbing death of a teenage Islamic State prisoner in Iraq and the shooting of unarmed Iraqi civilians.
Special operations chief Edward Gallagher has been jailed since his September arrest, and a judge said he would rule next week whether the 19-year navy veteran should be released before trial. He was due to stand trial 19 February.
Continue reading...