Response to the Draft of the ‘Global Code of Conduct for Investigating and Documenting Conflict-Related Sexual Violence’

Submission, The Murad Code Project, Institute for International Criminal Investigations and Foreign and Commonwealth Offic

\u3ci\u3eAmici Curiae\u3c/i\u3e Observations on Sexual- and Gender-Based Crimes, Particularly Sexual Slavery, and on Cumulative Convictions Pursuant to Rule 103 of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence

Sexual slavery is not a “form” of enslavement; rather, all acts of a sexual nature, including control over sexuality, sexual integrity and sexual and reproductive autonomy, constitute indicia of the exercise of powers of ownership of enslavement in all its forms. Consequently, enslavement as a crime against humanity is not “in the abstract entirely encompassed within sexual slavery.” To avoid entering cumulative convictions for separately enumerated crimes that do not each have a distinct element from the other, and to avoid a continuation of a discriminatory application of the law, amici suggest that, in the interests of justice, the Appeals Chamber reverse the Ongwen Trial Judgment on this point and enter convictions for enslavement rather than sexual slavery under crimes against humanity because conduct criminalised under sexual slavery constitutes criminal conduct already covered by enslavement. Amici believe that this would not be detrimental to Dominic Ongwen

Peace and Justice through a Feminist Lens: Gender Justice and the Women’s Court for the Former Yugoslavia

Post-conflict interventions to ‘deal with’ violent pasts have moved from exception to global norm. Early efforts to achieve peace and justice were critiqued as ‘gender-blind’—for failing to address sexual and gender-based violence, and neglecting the gender-specific interests and needs of women in transitional settings. The advent of UN Security Council resolutions on ‘Women, Peace and Security’ provided a key policy framework for integrating both women and gender issues into transitional justice processes and mechanisms. Despite this, gender justice and equality in (post-)conflict settings remain largely unachieved. This article explores efforts to attain gender-just peace in post-conflict Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). It critically examines the significance of a recent ‘bottom-up’ truth-telling project—the Women’s Court for the former Yugoslavia—as a locally engaged approach to achieving justice and redress for women impacted by armed conflict. Drawing on participant observation, documentary analysis, and interviews with women activists, the article evaluates the successes and shortcomings of responding to gendered forms of wartime violence through truth-telling. Extending Nancy Fraser’s tripartite model of justice to peacebuilding contexts, the article advances notions of recognition, redistribution and representation as crucial components of gender-just peace. It argues that recognizing women as victims and survivors of conflict, achieving a gender-equitable distribution of material and symbolic resources, and enabling women to participate as agents of transitional justice processes are all essential for transforming the structural inequalities that enable gender violence and discrimination to materialize before, during, and after conflict

A Feminist Critique of Approaches to International Criminal Justice in the Age of Identity Politics: A Case Study of Conflict-Related Sexual Violence Prosecutions Before the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

This chapter undertakes a feminist analysis of the problem of ‘gender’ in international criminal law (ICL) using the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) as a case study. It examines the construction of ‘gender’ within the positive legal norms and the jurisprudence of the ICTY, focusing on conflict-related sexual violence cases. The authors’ critical analysis reveals the gendered framework and values of ICL, and brings into question the gender-neutrality of international criminal justice. It shows the blind spots of this framework, and how it still operates to exclude gender as such. Studying the gendered framework of ICL illuminates the broader ‘gender trouble’ of international humanitarian law (IHL) as a protective and penal regime, and offers an important insight into the gendered operation of conflict and its legal regulation at the international level

If women are left out of peace talks

The exclusion of women from the process of making peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina has diminished the prospects for sustainable peace. When will we learn that no peace can be sustainable and just without the active and meaningful participation of women