The Trial of German Major War Criminals

1948 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 123-125
Author(s):  
Alan Bullock
Keyword(s):  
War Criminals

An Age-Old Question: Optical (A)llusions, (In)Decency, and (In)Justice in the Trial of Japanese War Criminals

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-23
Author(s):  
James Burnham Sedgwick
Keyword(s):  
Temporal Logic ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
International Justice ◽  
World War ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
War Criminals ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The Aesthetic

Abstract Timing complicates all dimensions of post conflict redress. Moving too fast suggests prejudice. Going too slow delays accountability and closure. This paper challenges the temporal logic of international justice. The prosecution of aged defendants created aesthetical dilemmas for war crimes operations in post-World War ii Asia. The unsettling optical allusions of frail perpetrators in court — shadows of their former selves — left many observers conflicted: it looked indecent, it felt unjust and underwhelming. The unseemly punishment of weak defendants undercut prosecution attempts to brand perpetrators as monsters. Disappointed reporters and trial authorities fixated on the shabby dress, waning physique, and benign senescence of once-sinister villains. Few questioned the accused’s guilt. Many felt unnerved by the optics. Ultimately, this paper shows how the staging and performance of justice impacts a court’s effectiveness. Unrelenting accountability, bringing all war criminals to justice, feels right. Yet, the aesthetic complications of prosecuting aged accused may not be worth it.

Amnesties in the Light of Developments in International Law and the Establishment of the International Criminal Court

2002 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-117 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Gavron
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
World War ◽  
Military Tribunal ◽  
War Criminals ◽  
The First World War ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Second World ◽  
First World

Amnesties presuppose a breach of law and provide immunity or protection from punishment. Historically amnesties were invoked in relation to breaches of the laws of war and were reciprocally implemented by opposing sides in an international armed conflict. The impact of the two world wars in the first half of the twentieth century, however, had considerable implications not only for the use of amnesties, but also for their legality under international law. The scale of the First World War precipitated a new phase of unilateral amnesty for the victors and prosecutions of war criminals for the defeated aggressor states.1 This precedent was followed after the Second World War,2 with the establishment of the first ‘international’3 criminal court, the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. However, the horrors perpetrated during the Second World War also prompted the development of a branch of international law aimed at recognising and protecting human rights in an attempt to prevent such atrocities being repeated.

scholarly journals “I Would Prefer to Be Famous”

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 372-390 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Karstedt
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
International Criminal Tribunal ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
World War ◽  
War Criminals ◽  
Atrocity Crimes ◽  
The Impact

The reentry of sentenced perpetrators of atrocity crimes is part and parcel of the pursuit of international and transitional justice. As men and women sentenced for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the other tribunals return from prisons into society and communities questions arise as to the impact their reentry has on deeply divided postconflict societies, in particular on victim groups. Contemporary international tribunals and courts mostly do not have penal or correctional policies of their own, and the legacy of early release, commuting of sentences and amnesties that Nuremberg and other post-World War II tribunals have left, is a particularly problematic one. Germany’s historical experience provides an analytic blueprint for understanding in which ways contemporary perpetrators return into changed and still fragile societies. This comparative analysis between Nuremberg and the ICTY is based on two data sets including information on returning war criminals sentenced in both tribunals. The comparative analysis focuses on four themes: politics of reentry, admission of guilt and justification, memoirs, and political activism.

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