Blog Entries for NickDonovan

Nazis were given safe haven in the U.S.A.

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 00:00:00 +0100

The leaked OSI report tells of a pattern: ignorance of their entry, toleration of their presence (and a welcome for some who were deemed valuable such as those involved in rocket design and research), followed eventually by quite vigorous official action.

Alas, history tends to repeat itself. The pattern of immigration and occasional tolerance by the U.S. authorities was followed for suspected war criminals from modern-day conflicts - from Yugoslavia, Guatemala, El Salva [...]

Constitutionalism: one step forwards, two steps back

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Political constitutionalism, broadly defined as the subjection of rulers to the rule of law, checks and balances and competing centres of power, took one step forward and two steps back this week.

First the good news. By a large margin Turkish voters approved amendments to their constitution. Among other things the changes remove Article 15, an obstacles to the prosecution of Generals involved in the 1980 coup, and reform the High Council for Judges and Prosecutors and the Constit [...]

Mao's Great Famine

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 00:00:00 +0100

In our post-modern world you sometimes see people wearing t-shirts bearing a hammer-and-sickle or a portrait of Mao. It would be nice to think they are being ironic, but safer to assume they are being ignorant of the crimes committed in utopia's name.

I have a friend from university who still describes himself as a Maoist. On occasion I have raised the issue of Mao's crimes with him, in a po-faced sort of way. I even had the bizarre experience of listening to him describe his a [...]

We have to give them so much that our stomach are empty of food: The Hidden Impact of Burma's ...

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Our friends and partners at ND Burma have released this new report today on the arbitrary and excessive system of 'taxation' in Burma.

What does taxation have to do with mass atrocities?

At its best a tax system can cement the bonds between citizen and state. The theory is that citizens demand accountability for the money they hand over to the state - demanding oversight and some form of democratic control. A lack of such a bond between citizen and state can be profoundl [...]

Extradition and ICTR transfers to Rwanda

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Sweden has; the UK, France, Germany and Switzerland haven't. The ICTR prosecutor would like to, the Appeals Chamber disagrees. I'm referring of course to the transfer or extradition of Rwandan genocide suspects back to Rwanda to face trial. Such proceedings have all been affected by concerns about the fairness of any trial.

Not touching on fair trial issues, the ICLS have published a very useful note on Rwanda's Transfer Law - of interest to any lawyer [...]

New Chinese judge at ICJ, not a fan of extra-territorial jurisdiction

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Xue Hanqin has just been elected to the International Court of Justice. You can find some glimpses of her views in a 2006 article: vaguely supportive of the ICC, not a fan of universal jurisdiction. Relevant section on UJ below:

At the moment, one of the most controversial issues with international criminal law is the question of universal jurisdiction. Under traditional international law, states establish universal jurisdiction over certain international crimes b [...]

Crimes Against Humanity committed against Burma's Rohingya people

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

The Irish Centre for Human Rights has just released an extensive report on the Rohingya people of Burma: Crimes Against Humanity in Western Burma: The Situation of of the Rohingyas. The Rohingya are a Muslim minority group resident in North Arakan state in Western Burma. The report finds that there is a prima facie case that crimes against humanity have been committed against them, namely forced labour, deportation and forcible transfer, rape and sexual violence, an [...]

Did the Holocaust lower economic growth in Russia?

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

What was the long term economic impact of the Final Solution in Russia? Daron Acemoglu - well known for his work on the long term role of institutions (rule of the game) on economic growth - and colleagues - have a new paper out which seeks to provide an answer. They hypothesize that it was the murder of a significant portion of the middle class which had a long term structural effect on the Russian economy.

Fascinating, not least as a reason why develop [...]

Wrong

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

This is wrong. Just wrong.

Life in North Korea

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Last week's Economist had a piece on North Korea remarkable for the numbers of mays, mights and maybes it employed. Not the fault of the author of course but a reflection of how little we know about life above the 38th parallel.

Ever since the sinking of the South Korean warship the Cheonan, determined by an international report to ha [...]

Victory for international justice in USA

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Our friends at the Center for Justice and Accountability - and the victims and survivors they work with - should be celebrating tonight. The Supreme Court ruled 9-0 that their case against former Somali Prime Minister Yousef Samantar can go ahead. At issue was a) whether or not state officials (as opposed to the foreign state itself) were immune from prosecution and lawsuits and b) if so, whether this immunity applied to former state officials.

The answ [...]

UK Party leaders talk about International Development

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 00:00:00 +0100

In the run up to the 2010 elections our friends at ONE have interviewed the main party leaders on their International Development policies. The political will is there from all three leaders (I've shared a platform with Nick Clegg speaking passionately about Darfuri asylum seekers during his campaign to be leader of the Lib Dems, early in his leadership David Cameron spoke about the Sudan at an Aegis event and the Tories frequently visit Rwanda, and in the video below Gordon Brown places his [...]

Everybody please calm down. The Pope can't be prosecuted in UK for Crimes Against Humanity

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 00:00:00 +0100

A lot of heat, but very little, light has been generated by the suggestion that the Pope be prosecuted in the UK for crimes against humanity.

The sexual crimes of paedophiles need to be punished appropriately, and any form of obfuscation and cover-up by authorities exposed, condemned and rectified. However, the suggestion that the Pope be arrested in the UK or crimes against humanity is a dead end for those looking for justice and accountability.

The UK doesn't have j [...]

Video games and international law

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Apart from an attempt to use video games as way of educating people about Darfur, the games industry isn't noted for its contribution to educating people away from violence. Indeed our friends at TRIAL spent many (no doubt enjoyable) hours breaking many of the Geneva Conventions in games such as Call of Duty.

No doubt, there's a concern about life imitating art. For instance, P.W. Singer in Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Confli [...]

A trial too far?

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 00:00:00 +0100

David Cesarani is a historian and researcher whose judgment is always sound. His book, Justice Delayed, about the campaign to bring to justice Nazi war criminals living in the UK, was a great influence on us as we campaigned (successfully) to change British law on suspected genocidaires from modern conflicts.

Therefore, its noteworthy that he's come out and called the Demjanjuk court proceedings a 'trial too far'. Essentially, his argument goes like this: justice isn't [...]

Global warming to exacerbate conflict in Africa?

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0100

Five years ago, when helping to write a Government strategy paper on weak and failing states - Countries at Risk of Instability - we looked long and hard at the so-called 'drivers of conflict'. Those factors which quantitative and qualitative studies found increased a countries 'proneness' to civil war. Several such drivers were clearly and consistently present: low income; economic decline; a history of past conflict. Others needed more careful contextual analysis: the presence of [...]

Perpetrators #1. Hannah Arendt's "Banality of Evil" phrase (and JA Hobson)

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:18:21 +0100

There's a fascinating article in Slate about Hannah Arendt, Heidegger and antisemitism. Ron Rosenbaum weaves Bernard Wasserstein's critique of Arendt's reliance on Nazi historians and JA Hobson (on whom more later) to help underpin her works, The Origins of Totalitarianism and Eichmann in Jerusalem, together with the seemingly never-ending drip drip drip of revelations about her lover Heidegger's Nazi sycophancy, in the hope of burying her phrase 'Banality of Evil' from public discourse.< [...]

Question Time debate no breakthrough for BNP

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 23:34:42 +0100

Today was the day in which the far-right, racist, British National Party, were invited on to the flagship BBC political debate show 'Question Time'.

It was billed as a big day for the British National Party. It was not, and will not be a breakthrough moment.

Nick Griffin came across, to put it mildly, badly. He was often flustered and incoherent, stumbling over lines and laughing inappropriately when faced with difficult questions. A far right party might have some suc [...]

Suspected war criminals in Australia

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0100

We recommend this very concise but useful policy brief from the Lowy Institute:

In this Policy Brief, Fergus Hanson looks at the Australian government's current approach to suspected war criminals living here. It finds Australia has inadvertently become a safe haven for suspected war criminals and needs to do more to meet its international obligations to end impunity for the world's worst criminal offenders. It suggests a number of modest reforms the Rudd government could impleme [...]

British Firm involved in Crimes Against Humanity

nick.donovan@aegistrust.org — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 00:00:00 +0100

Reading Kathleen Taylor's Cruelty recently (a good summary of the latest research on cruelty and sadism from the fields of neuroscience and socio-biology - on which I'll blog more when I have a bit more time) there was an intriguing reference to a Anglo-Peruvian firm involved in rubber extraction in the Putumayo region of the Amazon. Brutal punishments, enforced labour and sexual violence - all familiar to us from the rubber industry in King Leopold's Congo - reduced the popul [...]