Gender Report Card on the International Criminal ... - YWCA Canada

Judiciary – Key Decisions Victim Participation
Judge Monageng granted victim participant status
to eight applicants, including one non-profit
organisation. The seven individuals granted victim
participant status were all male. Some applicants
were held to have provided insufficient information
regarding the identity of deceased relatives to prove
emotional harm as a basis for participation, but
had provided sufficient evidence to prove economic
harm. An application for victim participation made
by an abbot on behalf of a parish was rejected on the
grounds that the abbot had not provided sufficient
evidence of his identity. Four additional applications
were not accepted, on the grounds of a disparity
between the dates of birth or ages provided in the
applications for participation and the dates of birth
contained on the applicants’ voting cards, which meant
that their identity was not sufficiently established.
These four applicants could, however, submit new
applications for participation in the future. The Single
Judge deferred consideration of these four applicants
(and one additional application on behalf of a parish)
pending the submission of additional information.
The Prosecutor v. Thomas Lubanga Dyilo
A total of 123 victims have been accepted to
participate in the Lubanga case, 1727 including 20
applications for participation accepted since 30 August
2010. 15 victims were accepted to participate in
proceedings in a decision of 8 February 2011, 1728 while
an additional five were accepted on 25 July 2011, only
a month before the closing arguments in the case. 1729
No gender breakdown of the current participating
victims is available.
A major issue which arose in the case related to
potential offences against the administration of justice
under Article 70. The Chamber sought the views of
the parties and participants in the case on the correct
application of Article 70 ‘in the context of an inquiry
by VWU regarding whether, after they had testified,
defence witnesses were subjected to pressure or
direct or indirect threats by a person recognised as a
victim in these proceedings’. 1730 At the time of writing,
no public proceedings under Article 70 have been
initiated against any of the victim participants in the
case. The filings related to the Article 70 proceedings
are discussed in greater detail in the Trial Proceedings
section of this <strong>Report</strong>.
The Trial Chamber issued a decision on 4 February
2011 ordering the disclosure of previously redacted
information regarding the applications for victim
participation for a number of victims who had testified
in the case. 1731 The Defence sought disclosure of
material from the application forms of three victim
participants, each of whom had testified in the
case. Although the information from the victims’
applications had been appropriately withheld
earlier in the trial, once evidence was introduced
before the Chamber indicating that false identities
of participating witnesses was an issue in the case,
the information contained in these forms became
disclosable to the Defence under both its right to
exculpatory evidence under Article 67(2) of the Statute
and its right to inspect material in the possession
or control of the Prosecution that is relevant for
preparation of the Defence under Rule 77 of the Rules
of Procedure and Evidence. The Defence specifically
sought information from the parts of the victims’
application forms in which the victims referred to
(i) individuals or organisations with whom they had
spoken about their security concerns; (ii) the name
of the individual who witnessed the signature on the
forms; (iii) the names of those from whom relevant
information was received; (iv) the names of those
who assisted in filling out the forms; (v) other victims
referred to in the forms; and (vi) in one instance, the
name of an individual the victim tried to assist.
Generally, Trial Chamber I held that those names
contained in the applications that had been previously
revealed, either in court or in private sessions with
the Legal Representative, were now disclosable.
The Chamber held that the names of people and
organisations which had not previously been disclosed
could now be disclosed if they were well-known and
would suffer no greater security risk as a result of the
disclosure. Where the Defence sought information as
to the identity of people that had not been disclosed,
the VRPS was to contact those individuals to determine
their views on the Defence being informed of their
identities and report back to the Chamber. 1732
1727 Based on figures provided by the VPRS by email dated 14
September 2011.
1728 ICC-01/04-01/06-2659-Corr-Red.
1729 ICC-01/04-01/06-2764-Red.
1730 The request for observations was made by email on 29
March 2011, as cited in ICC-01/04-01/06-2716, fn 1.
1731 ICC-01/04-01/06-2586-Red.
1732 ICC-01/04-01/06-2586-Red, para 51.
282