Authors:
- A clear-cut legal analysis regarding the debate on a State's obligations to investigate and prosecute serious violations of humanitarian and human rights law in countries in transition
- Comprehensively analyzes these obligations to investigate and prosecute
- In a departure from the majority view, it adopts a critical and nuanced approach firmly based on a classic international law methodology
- Sheds light on the 2016 Colombian Peace Agreement as a potential new paradigm
- Draws attention to the importance of a multidisciplinary approach squaring international law with international politics
- Hailed as "rigorous", "solid", of "excellent quality", and "exceptionally well researched"
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Table of contents (6 chapters)
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Front Matter
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Back Matter
About this book
This book brings a new focus to the ongoing debate on holding perpetrators of massive humanitarian and human rights violations accountable in countries in transition. It provides a clear-cut and comprehensive legal analysis of the content and nature of a state's obligations to investigate and prosecute as enshrined in the most important humanitarian and human rights treaties; it disentangles the common fallacy that these procedural obligations are naturally rooted and clearly spelled out in the general human rights treaties; and it explains the flaws in an absolutist interpretation. This analysis serves to understand whether such procedural obligations, if narrowly construed, act as impediments to countries emerging from periods of conflict or systematic repression in the face of contingent circumstances and the formidable dilemmas raised by a univocal understanding of justice as retribution.
Exploring the latest instances of interpretation and application via an analysis of state practice, the jurisprudence of treaty bodies, international courts and tribunals, soft law instruments, and doctrinal contributions, the book also addresses the complex issue of amnesty, and other transitional justice mechanisms designed to restore peace and facilitate transition traditionally included in national reconciliation programs, and criticizes the contention that amnesty is always prohibited by international law. It also considers these problems from the viewpoint of the International Criminal Court, focusing on the cases of Uganda and Colombia after the 2016 peace agreement.
Lastly, the volume offers a detailed analysis of techniques that may neutralize relevant obligations under international law, such as denunciation, derogation, limitation, and the public international law defenses of force majeure and necessity. Drawing attention to the importance of a multidisciplinary and practical approach to these unsettling questions, and endorsing a pluralistic notion of accountability, the book will appeal to legal scholars and transitional justice experts as well as practitioners, human rights advocates, and government officials.
Dr Jacopo Roberti di Sarsina is an International Law Expert at the Alma Mater Studiorum - University of Bologna School of Law, and a dual-qualified lawyer (Italy and New York). He completed a PhD in public international law, label Doctor Europaeus, at the School of International Studies, University of Trento, holds an LLM from NYU School of Law, and read law at the University of Bologna.
Keywords
- State Obligations to Investigate and Prosecute
- Serious Humanitarian and Human Rights Law Violations
- Successor Government
- Transition and Transitional Justice
- Amnesty and Pardon
- International Criminal Court
- 2016 Colombian Peace Agreement
- Derogation Clauses in Human Rights Treaties
- Circumstances Precluding Wrongfulness
- Force Majeure and Necessity
- war crime
Reviews
“This academic work is undoubtedly a valuable contribution to the field of international law and transitional justice, as the author skilfully manages to reconcile the ‘irreconcilable’ approaches from both fields, as well as convincingly demonstrate how flexible and original thinking can generate new academic insights in a field marred by divisive opinions.” (Iryna Marchuk,International Criminal Law Review, ICLA, Vol. 20, 2020)
Authors and Affiliations
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School of Law, Alma Mater Studiorum - University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
Jacopo Roberti di Sarsina
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Transitional Justice and a State’s Response to Mass Atrocity
Book Subtitle: Reassessing the Obligations to Investigate and Prosecute
Authors: Jacopo Roberti di Sarsina
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6265-276-7
Publisher: T.M.C. Asser Press The Hague
eBook Packages: Law and Criminology, Law and Criminology (R0)
Copyright Information: T.M.C. Asser Press and the author 2019
Hardcover ISBN: 978-94-6265-275-0Published: 08 April 2019
eBook ISBN: 978-94-6265-276-7Published: 26 March 2019
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XLII, 248
Topics: Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, Law of Armed Conflict, International Criminal Law , War Crimes, Human Rights and Crime