Features

March 25, 2009

Prosecuting Heads of State

In 1990, an era of accountability began for former government officials and heads of state who had committed human rights violations and other abuses of power while in office. Since then, at least 67 former heads of state have been formally prosecuted for serious human rights violations or economic crimes committed during their administration.

Prosecuting Heads of State analyzes the reasons for this historic shift, examining the use of criminal trials as a means of achieving accountability for serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law. The book details the emergence of regional trends in Europe and Latin America, and contains eight case studies of high-profile trials and their societal impact in Chile, Peru, the Philippines, Zambia, Rwanda, the Former Yugoslavia, Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Iraq.

Co-editor Caitlin Reiger is deputy director of the Prosecutions Program at ICTJ and head of ICTJ's Cambodia program. Among the book's contributors are Miranda Sissons, director of Institutional Development; Marieke Wierda, director of ICTJ's Prosecutions Program; and Abdul Tejan Cole, former deputy director of ICTJ's Africa Program. Ellen Lutz is the executive director of Cultural Survival, an international human rights organization that works on behalf of indigenous peoples.

Click here to purchase the book online, and here to read the book's Introduction (PDF).