Chair, Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, THE EVENTS

Early in the morning of 7 April 1994, a few hours after the small plane carrying the Presidents of Rwanda and Burundi had been shot down over Kigali, the Rwandan army, supported by the youth militia 'Interahamwe', started a mass slaughter of civilians, mainly tutsis, in the propaganda called "cockroaches", but also moderate hutus, so-called "accomplices". The following days, massacres spread from Kigali throughout Rwanda.

In short time, the ancient 'land of a thousand hills' was turned into hell on earth.

Road blocks were erected, and thousands of people, principally tutsi, identified by their ID cards, were taken away to be shot or hacked to death. Mass killings also ocurred in places of refuge, such as churches, hospitals and schools. Others, identified by pre-prepared death-rolls, were butchered in their homes and villages. Women and small girls were raped, after which many of them were drowned in latrines or thrown into mass graves. .

Clearly, these killings had been meticulously planned.

The idea behind them was similar to that of the Nazi "final solution". The initiators spoke of "finally solving the tutsi problem". In other words to exterminate the country's tutsi minority.

After one hundred days, one of the worst genocides ever had been carried out. It is estimated that between 800,000 and one million human beings were killed. Many more suffered long term physical and mental injuries.

UNITED NATIONS
It is a well-known fact that the United Nations failed to take the actions needed to prevent or stop this genocide [ cf. the official report presented to the Security Council in December 1999 by an Independent Inquiry, chaired by Mr Ingvar Carlsson, former Prime Minister of Sweden].

However, a few months after the events, in November 1994, in order to bring those responsible for the massacres to justice, the Security Council, acting under Chapter VII of the UN Charter, decided to establish the Rwanda Tribunal (UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, ICTR). Its organization is partially common with that of the Yugoslavia Tribunal (ICTY) in The Hague. For instance, the Chief Prosecutor is the same person.

The new Tribunal was given the power to prosecute persons responsible for serious violations of international humanitarian law, genocide and crimes against humanity in Rwanda and neighbouring countries between 1 January and 31 December 1994.

It was envisaged that the Tribunal would concentrate its efforts on bringing to court the "big fish", the architects behind the 1994 events.

For security reasons, the seat of the Rwanda Tribunal was established in the small Tanzanian town of Arusha, located at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro and Mount Meru, two hours flight away from Kigali. Yet, the Office of the Prosecutor was stationed in Kigali, closer to the actual scene of the crimes.

THE TRIBUNAL
After often criticized and quite disturbing initial administrative shortcomings, the Tribunal is today able report on a series of crucial achievements [www.ictr.org]. It can also be noted that communication with the people and government of Rwanda over the years improved considerably.

The first accused was transferred to the UN Custody in Arusha in July 1996, and together with two colleagues I sat on his trial as from January 1997.

To date, over 60 suspects have been indicted, of whom about 50 have been arrested in some 20 countries in Africa, Europe and North America and, in co-operation with those countries, successfully tranferred to Arusha.

Amongst these detainees are:

- twelve Ministers,
- many other senior civilian and military officials,
- prominent businessmen,
- church leaders,
- radio journalists, etc.

After extremely complex trials, which in total required hearing over 400 witnesses and experts, and studying of numerous other documentation, the Tribunal's three Trial Chambers have so far produced over 500 decisions on legal questions in the various cases. They include nine judgements, resulting in eight convictions and one acquittal. It has been noted that these judgements and sentences, each of which can cover more than 300 pages in both English and French, have been generally praised in different quarters all over the world for their high judicial quality. Until now, the Tribunal's Appeals Chamber in The Hague has confirmed six of the convictions.

The convictions include legal history's first for the crime of genocide. Having reviewed evidence on the 1994 events, which had been presented over more than twelve months, in the 'Akayesu' judgement of 1998, we found it legally proved that these events constituted genocide. Too, it has been noted that we broke new legal ground by holding that rape and sexual violence could also constitute genocide.

In addition, the conviction of Jean Kambanda, Prime Minister during the 1994 events, deserves to be particularly mentioned here. We found him guilty of genocide, crime against humanity, and other violations of international humanitarian law, and sentenced him to life imprisonment. This was the first time a Head of Government was convicted for such offences. Kambanda is now serving his sentence in Mali, along with five other ICTR convicts.

This judgement and others review extensively the concept of 'command responsibility' under international criminal law, by which a superior under certain conditions is responsible for the acts of his or her subordinates, and the prosecution thereof. This form of responsibility is now also at issue for instance in the Milosevic case before the Yugoslavia Tribunal.

As from the beginning of this month of April 2002, the Rwanda Tribunal has eight trials going on, implicating 21 accused. One of these cases concern four high-ranking military, including the notorious Colonel Bagosora, allegedly a leading figure during the genocide, not least in its first stage.

Efforts are being made to speed up to the extent possible the pace of the Court's work. This is particularly necessary given the fact that, as time passes, eye witnesses of course tend to forget the details of the events. In addition, some UN Member Countries, like the United States, are beginning to express their impatience.

MEANS TO FORWARD A RECONCILIATION IN RWANDA

It is generally held that not only States but also the international community has a duty in ensuring that "justice is done and seen to be done".

Yet, the work of the UN Tribunal is of course but one way to help the process of reconciliation in Rwanda.

A long range of other such measures are already in operation or in progress or can be expected to be put forward, for instance by different participants in this Stockholm International Forum, say: democracy development, education concerning human rights, political decisions, economic reform and support, medical and social assistance to the victims, national commissions, further investigation and fact-finding, both classical and traditional (gacaca) justice, and so forth.

Everybody would certainly agree that these and similar means can be essential in advancing the reconciliation programme.

Moreover, despite the costs involved, the activity of the Tribunal seems to be absolutely indispensable in contributing to the healing process in Rwanda. This is my firm belief as an ICTR Judge, who closely examined, during nearly five years, the 1994 events in many of its horrible details, not least from a human aspect.

Yet, this Tribunal should of course continue to work besides national jurisdiction in Rwanda and even in other countries (such as Belgium and Switzerland).

And trials cannot solve all the problems. Therefore, I repeat, it is necessary that also other measures, like the ones already mentioned, are being realized.

Anyhow, by being deliberately limited by rules of procedure to dealing with a specific issue in each case, as described in the indictment, a fair and public criminal trial has particular advantages. After leaving the floor open to two opposite parties and after a close, objective and professional examination of the evidence, it is bringing to light a relatively concentrated statement with a certain exactness and a hopefully convincing reasoning, based on worldwide accepted law.

An added benefit of the Rwanda Tribunal is that of concretely documenting at least parts of the events in 1994.

Indeed, the crimes over which the Tribunal has jurisdiction occur within a context of either widespread massacres or armed conflict. Consequently, the evidence and documentation presented during the judicial proceedings in Arusha relate not only to the specific actions of the accused, but also to the general context in which they occurred.

In each case, when written down, witness statements, mostly by eye witnesses, can cover 6,000 to 8,000 pages. In addition, the ICTR archives contain photographs, video tapes, and other documentation. All this invalueable material forms a useful supplement to archives like the Nuremberg Trial archives of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) at the Peace Palace in The Hague, the Cambodian Documentation Centre in Phnum Penh, and the ICTY archives in The Hague.

The ICTR judgements, rendered after an intendedly thorough and scrupulous account and examination of the evidence, are thus not only statements of law, but are also meant to represent , to the extent possible, an accurate and impartial analysis of the events in many of its details.

So the Rwanda Tribunal's archives, including its judgements, are there to serve as important historical records, and contribute to the basis for further analysis of the motivations and factors behind genocide.

In a wider legal perspective, in many countries it is noted that the practice by both existing 'ad hoc' Criminal Tribunals (ICTY and ICTR) have been forging a substantial body of case law in the field of international humanitarian law.

In dealing with perpetrators of crimes which shock the conscience of humanity, the work of these two sister Tribunals will undoubtedly provide a sound foundation also for the work of national courts and of the permanent International Criminal Court (ICC) to be established in The Hague as from 1 July 2002,

A CLEAR MESSAGE

Chair,
let me conclude by stressing that the signal so far given by the Rwanda Tribunal to the people of Rwanda and to the rest of the world is crystal clear:

- Acts like mass murder or mass rape are not free of charge, wherever committed. Impunity can be replaced by accountability. The Geneva Conventions are kept alive. Those who are breaking the law risk to be punished.
- To have obeyed an order does not constitute an excuse.
- All individuals have their own value and also their own responsibility.

Thank you.