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Mr Salih Mustafa, a former commander of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), was accused of four war crimes including arbitrary detention, cruel treatment, torture, and murder. For three weeks in August of 1999, Mr Mustafa and his subordinates imprisoned six civilians in a barn at a compound held by the KLA in Zllash, Kosovo.  

The court found, through the testimony of the five detainees who survived, that Mr Mustafa and his men subjected the detainees to inhumane conditions and treatment. The detainees were beaten with batons and hatchet handles, burned, electrocuted, threatened, and given urine when they complained of thirst. The court found that Mr Mustafa and his subordinates committed these acts against these victims together as part of a joint criminal enterprise. Their actions and refusal to provide medical care to the victims even led to the death of one of the detainees.

The court convicted Mr Mustafa of the war crimes of arbitrary detention, torture, and murder. The court found that the crime of cruel treatment is included in the crime of torture so it would be unnecessary to convict the accused of both crimes. The court sentenced Mr Mustafa to 26 years imprisonment  and ordered him to pay reparations of €207,000 to the victims.

The armed conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo opposed numerous tribes of different ethnicities in their struggle to gain power and territory, particularly over the Ituri province in the north-eastern part of the DRC, an area rich in natural resources such as gold and diamonds. One such group, the Union Patriotique des Congolais, was established in 2000 and appointed Lubanga as its chairman. He was also the commander in chief of the armed wing of the UPC, the Front Patriotique pour la Libération du Congo. This armed group was well known for its use of young children to participate in the hostilities, from fighting, to cooking, cleaning, spying, and being used as sexual slaves.

Lubanga was convicted by Trial Chamber I in the International Criminal Court’s first verdict for the war crime of conscripting, enlisting or using children under the age of 15 to actively participate in hostilities. He was sentenced to 14 years’ imprisonment on 10 July 2012, with credit for the 6+ years he had spent in detention in the Netherlands during his trial. In determining the appropriate sentence, the Court assessed the gravity of the crimes by considering the age and particular vulnerability of the victims. However, it also considered that Lubanga’s cooperation with the Court and respectful attitude even despite the Prosecution’s conduct merited mitigation. 

Dragoljub Kunarac, Radomir Kovač, and Zoran Vuković were brought before the ICTY for their roles in the commission of crimes against the Bosnian Muslim civilians between April 1992 and February 1993. During this time, an armed conflict existed between the Bosnian Serbs and the Bosnian Muslims, and the Bosnian Serb Army and paramilitary groups detained Bosnian Muslim women and subjected them to repeated rapes, torture and other mistreatments.

The Trial Chamber found that Dragoljub Kunarac, Radomir Kovač, and Zoran Vuković were guilty of crimes against humanity and violations of laws or customs of war, sentencing them to 28, 20, and 12 years of imprisonment, respectively.

The three Appellants raised several grounds of appeal, arguing that the Trial Chamber erred in several of its factual and legal findings. Among others, the Appellants argued that the Trial Chamber erroneously assessed the contextual elements of crimes against humanity and war crimes as well as the separate definitions of the charged offences of enslavement, rape, torture, and outrages upon personal dignity.

The Appeals Chamber rejected all grounds of appeal adduced by the Appellants. Subsequently, it affirmed the sentences imposed by the Trial Chamber.

Agathe Habyarimana (maiden name: Agathe Kanziga) is the widow of former Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana, whose death on 6 April 1994 marked the beginning of the Rwandan genocide that was to result in the death of some 500,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus within the lapse of a few months. Agathe Habyarimana is frequently regarded as one of the powers behind Juvénal habyarimana’s Presidencey and as part of the inner circle responsible for the planification and organisation of the Rwandan genocide. On 9 April 1994, she was airlifted to France.

In July 2004, she applied for refugee status but her application was denied by the French Office of Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons (OFPRA). By the present decision, the Appeals Commission for Refugees confirmed the rejection and concluded that she had participated in the planning, organising and direction of the genocide in Rwanda since 1990. 

Agathe Habyarimana (maiden name: Agathe Kanzigas) is the widow of former Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana whose death on 6 April 1994 marked the beginning of the Rwandan genocide that was to result in the death of some 500,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus within the lapse of a few months. Agathe Habyarimana is frequently regarded as one of the powers behind Juvénal habyarimana’s Presidencey and as part of the inner circle responsible for the planification and organisation of the Rwandan genocide. On 9 April 1994, she was airlifted to France.

In July 2004, she applied for refugee status but her application was denied by the French Office of Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons (OFPRA). The rejection was confirmed on appeal by the Appeals Commission for Refugees in February 2007.

On appeal to the Conseil d’Etat, the highest administrative court in France, Agathe Habyarimana sought to prove that the Appeals Commission had committed an error in law and in fact when it concluded that she had participated in the planning, organising and direction of the genocide in Rwanda since 1990 and ultimately denied her request to overturn the rejection of her request for refugee status. The Conseil d’Etat rejected the appeal by a decision of 16 October 2009.