Ongoing controversies in two of the quintessential cases of divided societies - Northern Ireland and the Former Yugoslavia - are best understood by examining the political dynamics created through procedures of remembrance, and those of reconciliation.
A policy of non-cooperation with the International Criminal Court (ICC) will leave the victims of 2007/8 post-election violence without a legal remedy, and may prompt new violence in upcoming elections. It will also present a devastating blow to international justice if left unopposed.
Ten years on from the Gujurat riots, the survivors still do not have justice and the bureaucracies that made them possible remain unchanged. This is not a one-off but a trend, which it will take hard questions and an insistence on answers to reverse.
This week is the third anniversary of the end the Sri Lankan civil war. Yet there is hope: it lies within Sri Lanka's reach to move from 'post-war' to 'post-conflict', as Sri Lankans work towards a new era of equitable governance.See the debate: Is reconciliation possible in Sri Lanka?
The most important of the secondary effects of the guilty verdict against Charles Taylor will be the notion that those who support the wars of others can be found culpable of the crimes committed by those they support. That should be a warning to many state officials who relate to irregular armed
Derry/Londonderry is the UK City of Culture in 2013. In a place where names can be rigid markers of enmity, what tools can we use to dismantle the unseeing ways ‘the enemy’ is passed between generations?
India has tried to strike a balance between support for the Sri Lankan government and calls for Tamil rehabilitation - ultimately backing the UN resolution urging Sri Lanka to investigate abuses of international law during the final phase of the civil war. Behind this lie a number of external, int
The complexity of local and regional conflict dynamics in Afghanistan and Pakistan would be well served by the revivification of the Jirga system, the only convincing institutional base through which to build lasting peace.
We should not deny Ugandans the chance to bring a man who has committed horrific crimes to justice. However we must be careful that our moral greed does not inadvertently force Ugandan reconciliation backwards.
The Tamil call for independent statehood stemmed from a very basic need for security against genocide. For many, including the next generation of Tamil youth activists, the events of 2009 consolidated this need.
While criticism of the ICT is important, its chief critics have dehistoricized the context in which this trial is taking place, and expressed disdain in terms which position Bangladesh as the under-developed, untrustworthy ‘Other’.
Unless the past is articulated in such a way in which the connection of events and experiences are integrated in a real and meaningful way, the ‘truths’ which drove conflict will continue to be reproduced.
