That Someone Guilty Be Punished - International Center for ...

Tribunal’s expressive function in abstract terms, to situate the Tribunal’s accomplishments
in a larger context than Bosnia, and to understand the reasons behind ICTY practices. While
these individuals often refer to other, less educated, Bosnians as “ordinary people” or “direct
victims,” many if not most of the urban intellectuals interviewed for this study also endured
harrowing war crimes. 130
A. “That Someone Guilty Be Punished” 131
The purpose of a trial is to render justice, and nothing else …. Hence, to the question most
commonly asked about the Eichmann trial: What good does it do?, there is but one possible
answer: It will do justice. 132
Today, it is commonplace outside of Bosnia to ask in relation to international tribunals much
the same question that, in Hannah Arendt’s words, was “most commonly asked about the
Eichmann trial” almost half a century ago: What good does it do? 133 Yet for many survivors of
Bosnia’s wartime atrocities, the question answers itself.
Sadik Trako, who heads the Association of Victims and Missing Persons in Lašva Valley
in central Bosnia, said all that he thought necessary on the point: “For me, the Hague Tribunal
is an extremely important institution because it is that court which is going to punish the
perpetrators.” 134 Like many survivors, Mirsad Duratović, who was 17 when he was detained in
the notorious concentration camp in Omarska and who lost more than 60 relatives during
the Serb takeover of Prijedor, is perplexed when asked to explain why he supports the ICTY
despite myriad disappointments in its performance. “What I have gone through,” he explains,
“I think whoever was in my shoes would actually like to see some justice being done.” If the
interviewer ever went through what he did, Duratović continued, “then it would be clear to
you … why you want [justice].” 135
Although often overlooked in the literature on the ICTY, the UN Security Council recognized
the importance of what some of our interlocutors call “justice for its own sake” 136
when it established the Tribunal. In the resolution creating the ICTY, the Council cited its
determination not only to deter further atrocities but also “to take effective measures to bring
to justice the persons who are responsible for them.” 137 In the ICTY’s first annual report to the
UN General Assembly and Security Council, then ICTY President Antonio Cassese described
this aim with elegant simplicity—“to do justice.” 138
More than any other justifying aim of the ICTY, bringing those responsible to justice
seems to have special resonance for victims in Bosnia. As law professor Jasna Bakšić Muftić
noted, “After all kinds of war crimes and genocide, the people need some sort of satisfaction
… that someone guilty be punished.” 139 Reflecting on many victims’ continuing support for the
ICTY in the face of widespread disappointment in its sentences, Mirsad Tokača, who has met
34 VICTIMS’ JUSTICE