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On 11 September 1973, General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte assumed power in Chile as a result of a military coup that overthrew the then government of President Allende. Pinochet was the Commander in Chief of the Chilean Army until 1974 when he assumed the title of President of the Republic. His presidency lasted until 1990 and his role as Commander in Chief until 1998. His regime was known for its systematic and widespread violations of human rights, with allegations of murder, torture and hostage taking of political opponents.

In 1998, during a visit to the United Kingdom for medical treatment, Pinochet was arrested by the English authorities with a view to extraditing him to Spain where a Spanish judge had issued an international arrest warrant. His extradition was, however, not to proceed smoothly as Pinochet applied to have the arrest warrant quashed on the grounds that as a former Head of State he enjoyed immunity from criminal proceedings.

The present decision of 24 March 1999 by the House of Lords held that Pinochet is not entitled to immunity in respect of charges of torture and conspiracy to commit torture where such conduct was committed after 8 December 1988, the date upon which the 1984 Torture Convention entered into force in the UK. This temporal qualification significantly limited the charges for which Pinochet can be extradited to Spain as the majority of the conduct alleged was either not an extraditable offence or was committed prior to this date. Under English law, it was now for the Home Secretary, then Jack Straw, to decide whether or not to issue an authority to proceed with extradition. 

After the referendum on the independence of East Timor from Indonesia, violence erupted between pro-independence and pro-integration groups. On September 6, 1999 the Ave Maria church in Suai, in the Kovalima regency, in which civilians were taking refuge, was attacked by pro-integration militias Laksaur and Mahidi. The militias entered the church with homemade firearms and sharp weapons, killing 27 people.

At the time of the attack on the church in Suai, Herman Sedyono, an Indonesian Army Officer, was the regent or Chief of Kovalima regency and as such the head of government and the head of the regional authorities.

Before the attack a meeting took place at the official residence of Herman Sedyono. Herman Sedyono and the four other accused, Lilik Kushardianto,  Ahmad Syamsuddin, Sugito (Indonesian military officials) and Gatot Subyakto (a police officer) were all present at the incident at the Suai Church.

The Court found that grave human rights violations, in the form of murder as a crime against humanity, had taken place at the Suai Church. The crimes against humanity were committed by militia groups Laksaur and Mahidi. The Court found insufficient proof that the accused were responsible for the attacks on the basis of command responsibility. With regard to Herman Sedyono and Gatot Subyakto, the Court found that they were not military commanders or persons that effectively act as military commanders, as Sedyono was in function of head of the government and Subyakto was a police officer. The Court concluded that there was no organisational relation between the militias and the accused and that the accused had no effective control over the militias, so that the accused could not be held responsible for their actions. 

On 21 February 2003, Trial Chamber I of the ICTR delivered its unanimous judgment on the case of Elizaphan and Gérard Ntakirutimana. Gérard Ntakirutimana, a medical doctor practicing at the Mugonero Adventist hospital, was convicted of genocide and of crimes against humanity (murder). His father, Elizaphan Ntakirutimana, a senior pastor of the Seventh-day Adventist church in Mugonero was convicted of aiding and abetting in genocide.

The two Accused jointly faced two indictments, the “Mugonero” indictment with five counts and the “Bisesero” indictment with seven counts. Both indictments charged them with genocide, in the alternative complicity in genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide as well as crimes against humanity. The Accused allegedly participated in killings, attacks and caused serious bodily and mental harm to a large number of men, women and children who sought refuge in the Mugonero Adventist complex as well as in the area of Bisesero.

Pastor Ntakirutimana was sentenced to ten years of imprisonment while his son, Gérard, was sentenced to imprisonment for twenty five years. In both cases credit was given for the time they had already served in the United States and in Arusha.

Ten men were certified by the Secretary of State as suspected international terrorists and were detained in the Belmarsh prison in London. The certification was made on the basis of information obtained by torture (infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person in order to obtain information). The men appealed their certification and claimed that the tainted information should not have been admitted. The House of Lords held that such information, indeed, should not have been admitted and allowed the appeals.