Search results

Milisav Gavrić was born on 18 November 1948. He was a member of the Bratunac Police Station, and the Deputy Chief of the Srebrenica Police Station. On 4 June 2008, Gavrić was indicted by the Prosecutor's Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina. According to the allegations, Gavrić, acting alone or together with other members of the military of the Republika Srpska, committed crimes against Bosniak civilians in the Srebrenica enclave between 10 July and 19 July 1995. The specific crimes included capturing Bosniaks and inflicting injuries on them, the separation of women and men, the transfer of women and children, and the execution of Bosniak men.

On 4 June 2008, a preliminary hearing judge of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina issued an indictment against Gavrić, charging him with crimes against humanity.

In August 1998, the US Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by terrorists loyal to Osama bin Laden. In retaliation, President Clinton ordered a missile strike on the El-Shaifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, Sudan, arguing that it was a base for terrorism. Later, it was proven that the plan had no ties to terrorists. Therefore, El-Shifa Pharmaceutical Industries brought complaints against the United States in the US Court of Federal Claims.

In November 2005, the District Court found that El-Shifa Pharmaceutical Industries raised a non-justiciable political question (which foresees that courts have no authority to hear or adjudge on matters that raise political, rather than legal, questions) in asking the Court to adjudge on the President’s powers to designate as enemy property the private property of the chemical plant in Sudan.

On 27 March 2009, the Court of Appeals affirmed the decision of the District Court, holding that the case raised a political question, and therefore barring the court from hearing the matter.

El-Shifa Pharmaceutical Industries filed a petition to the Court of Appeals asking for the case to be re-heard by the court sitting en banc (where the case is heard before all judges of the court). On 3 August 2009, the Court of Appeals granted their petition, ordering that the case be re-heard by the court sitting en banc and vacating the earlier judgment of 27 March 2009.

After the fall of the Cambodian government in 1975, the Communist Party, under the leadership of Pol Pot, came to power and renamed the state the Democratic Kampuchea. An armed conflict broke out with Vietnam, which lasted until 1979. From 1975 until 1979, Pol Pot and the Communist Party of Kampuchea sought to establish a revolutionary state and introduced a policy of ‘smashing’ their enemies, a form of physical and psychological destruction that consisted of arbitrary detention, torture and execution. This policy was implemented at a number of interrogation centres, one of which was S21. Duch, a former mathematics teacher, was the Chairman of S21 responsible for extracting confessions and information, and teaching interrogation techniques.

In the first ever judgment of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, the Trial Chamber convicted Duch of multiple counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity. He was sentenced to 35 years’ imprisonment, minus five years as a result of his unlawful detention by the Cambodian Military Court for eight years prior to his transfer to the ECCC. This was also the first case before an international tribunal to allow victims of the crimes to participate in proceedings as civil parties and claim reparations for the harm they have suffered. 

In October 1991, the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina declared independence from Yugoslavia resulting in a civil war between the Bosnian Serbs and the Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims) in order to gain control of territory. The enclave of Srebrenica, near the border with Serbia, became a refuge for Bosniak civilians from nearby areas a Bosnian Serb forces obtained greater control over the surrounding area. A UN peacekeeping compound was based at Potocari in Srebrenica composed of lightly armed Dutch peacekeepers who were entrusted with keeping the area free from attack.

From 6 to 8 July 1995, Bosnian Serb forces attacked the Srebrenica enclave and shelled the township and on 11 July 1995, Bosnian Serb troops entered Srebrenica unopposed.

The Bosnian Serb troops proceeded to separate the women, children and elderly men from the military aged and able bodied males. The former group were loaded onto buses and transported to areas under the control of the Bosnian Serb Army. The men were hoarded onto separate buses and, in the coming days, were detained and summarily executed by members of the VRS (Republika Srpska Army) and police units including the 1st Company of the Jahorina Training Center of the Special Police Brigade of the MUP RS (Republika Sprska Ministry of the Interior). Some 40,000 people were forcibly transferred and between 7000 and 8000 men were executed.

Duško Jević, Mendeljev Đurić, Goran Marković and Nedo Ikonić all occupied leadership positions within the Jahorina Training Center with Jević being the overall Commander. The War Crimes Chamber of the State Court of Bosnia & Herzegovina convicted Jević and Đurić of genocide for their participation in Srebrenica and sentenced them to 35 and 30 years’ imprisonment respectively. Marković and Ikonić were acquitted. 

The pronouncement of this judgment constituted one of the fastest completions of a trial of this level in the history of the Tribunal. Nizeyimana, the Accused, known as the ‘Butcher of Butare’, went on trial in January 2011. In 54 trial days, the parties presented evidence from 84 witnesses. During the proceedings almost 130 decisions were issued. The judgment was rendered just over six months from the parties’ closing submissions.

The Accused is a former captain at the Butare military academy called the École des Sous-Officiers (ESO). The Prosecution charged him with genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes for violence perpetrated in Butare prefecture, and, for the most part, in Butare town for mobilising ESO soldiers and others to rape and kill Tutsis, as well as other civilians.

Nizeyimana was found guilty of genocide, extermination and murder as crimes against humanity and murder as war crime. He was sentenced to life imprisonment.