[SimeyTheLimey]

This is quite something. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda has found three media executives guilty of inciting the genocide of 800,000 people. That's the first time such convictions have happened since WW-II. To my knowledge, that is the first time there have been convictions enforcing the otherwise toothless 1948 Genocide Convention.

The article is from the New York Times, which requires registration. So I'm going to post it here.

December 3, 2003
Court Finds Rwanda Media Executives Guilty of Genocide
By SHARON LaFRANIERE

ARUSHA, Tanzania Dec. 3 — In the first verdict of its kind since the Nuremberg trials, an international court today convicted three Rwandan news media executives of genocide for helping to incite a killing spree by machete-wielding gangs who slaughtered about 800,000 Tutsis in neighboring Rwanda in early 1994.

A three judge panel found that the three defendants used a radio station and a twice-monthly newspaper to inflame ethnic hatred that eventually led to massacres at churches, schools, hospitals and roadblocks. The radio station, dubbed Radio Machete in Rwanda, guided killers to specific victims, broadcasting the names, license plate numbers and hiding places of Tutsis.

The Rwanda genocide is considered the worst ethnic killing since the Holocaust. In 100 days, an estimated 10 percent of the Tutsis in Rwanda were wiped out, along with many moderates among the Hutus, who make up the majority of the population. The efficiency of the killers, who chased down the Tutsis at roadblocks and in the streets with sharpened sticks, nail-studded clubs and grenades, surpassed even that of the Nazis, some historians contend.

The United Nations, which failed to intervene during the genocide, set up the tribunal three months afterward to bring those who led the massacres to account.

Today's verdict was the first conviction of news media executives for crimes of genocide since 1946, when the famous Nuremberg tribunal sentenced the Nazi publisher Julius Streicher to hang for his vitriolic campaign against the Jews. The Arusha judges sentenced two defendants to life in prison and the third to 27 years, reducing it from the life term they said he deserved because his rights were violated early in the case.

"The power of the media to create and destroy human values comes with great responsibility," the court said in a 29-page summary of its judgment. "Those who control the media are accountable for its consequences."

Elated prosecutors heralded the decision as a significant victory. "This is really a ground-breaking decision," said Stephen Rapp, the prosecutor in the case.

"This is going to change things," said another prosecutor, Simone Monasebian.

John Floyd, who defended one of the executives, a newspaper editor named Hassan Ngeze, denounced the verdict as a major setback for free speech and an invitation to dictators to close down any media outlet that is out of favor.

"This is a terrible, terrible decision, the worst decision in the history of international justice," Mr. Floyd said. "This is very, very dangerous. This case would have been laughed out of an American court."

Two of the defendants, Ferdinand Nahimana and Jean-Bosco Barayagwiza, were founders of RTLM radio station, which prosecutors said had a huge influence in a country where people primarily rely on the radio for news. The case against the two turned on the question of whether they intended to create a frenzy of violence, or simply failed to control the station.

The judges found that both men, as well as Ngeze, the newspaper editor, had to know that the broadcasts and articles would unleash violence given the political climate in Rwanda at the time. They cited the words of one witness who testified: "What RTLM did was almost to pour petrol, to spread petrol throughout the country little by little, so that one day it would be able to set fire to the whole country." Nahimana's attorney, Jean- Marie Biju-Duval, said the judges disregarded a raft of witnesses who testified that his client had only a slender connection to RTLM. "He was convicted as a symbolic scapegoat," he said.

Besides drawing a legal boundary between protected speech and criminal incitement to mass murder, the tribunal's judges and prosecutors said the case vindicated the court's painfully slow and hugely expensive approach to delivering justice in a region where impunity of the powerful has long been the rule.

The international court, one of three or four ad-hoc United Nations tribunals, has struggled in recent years to justify itself in the face of intense criticism of its handling of genocide cases. In nine years of adjudication, it has produced only 17 convictions despite having a staff of 872 and an annual budget of $88 million. By contrast, the criminal court at the Hague, set up to investigate alleged war crimes by the former Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic and others during the Balkans war of the last decade, has achieved more than 30 convictions and guilty pleas in a decade of work.

Officials here say the Arusha court has suffered from a shortage of judges, lack of leadership in the prosecutor's office and periodic resistance from the Rwandan government. The tribunal hit a low point in 2002, when two organizations of genocide survivors in Rwanda urged people who had witnessed acts of genocide to withhold their testimony in the trials. The groups complained the court was too slow, that it failed to pursue rape charges and that it had hired defense investigators who had themselves participated in the killings.

But the tribunal officials said today's verdict, the second in a week, was a sign that the tribunal has overcome most of its troubles. The pace of trials has clearly picked up: in the past month, two new cases have begun against eight ministers of the interim Hutu regime that ruled during the course of the genocide. Four more verdicts are expected later this year.

Since August, the United Nations has given the court more judges and appointed a new lead prosecutor, Hassan Jallow, to replace Carla del Ponte, who was splitting her time between the Yugoslavia and Rwanda cases. Mr. Jallow has at least temporarily patched up relations with the Rwandan government and the survivor groups and is reviewing all the ongoing investigations in hope of meeting the United Nations' 2008 deadline for the tribunal to finish.

Still unresolved, however, is the contentious issue of what legal authority will pursue charges that members of Rwanda's current Tutsi-controlled government engineered the revenge killings of thousands of Hutus after they overthrew the Hutu's regime in the summer of 1994. Rwandan officials say they want to handle that inquiry themselves. Should the tribunal relinquish that investigation, some critics say, it will undermine trust that it delivers even-handed justice.

Moreover, one intrinsic flaw in the tribunal was underscored in the process. Today's proceeding, like all the others, took place at an international conference center in Arusha, one nation and 1,200 miles from the capital of Rwanda. The tribunal set up shop here because the United Nations considered post-conflict Rwanda to be too unsafe and too traumatized to host an international court.

But as a result, few Rwandans feel like they are a part of the process, except for the witnesses who are flown back and forth in the United Nations's twin-engine Beechcraft airplane.

What today's verdict will do, according to Rapp, the prosecutor, is make clear that the media directors are responsible for broadcasts and articles that incite violence, even if they are not in day-to-day control of their news outlets. In closing arguments, he argued that the defendants each caused more deaths than any single, machete-toting Hutu because they whip up a mass hysteria which fostered thousands of killers.

"The media was every bit as important as the weapons of war," he said in an interview.

NYT

One thing I should probably point out. This was not the International Criminal Court. This was one of the two ad hoc courts established by the UN Security Council. Those courts have their critics because of their inefficiency (as noted in the article), but there is general consensus on their mission. From what I have read about the genocide, there is also no doubt in my mind that this is a just conviction.

[christ]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
The New York Times ... requires registration...

macnn/macnn works in a lot of places, including the NYT.

[christ]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
...One thing I should probably point out. This was not the International Criminal Court. This was one of the two ad hoc courts established by the UN Security Council. Those courts have their critics because of their inefficiency (as noted in the article), but there is general consensus on their mission. From what I have read about the genocide, there is also no doubt in my mind that this is a just conviction.

So couldn't something similar have been done for Afghanistan?

[davesimondotcom]

Originally posted by christ:
macnn/macnn works in a lot of places, including the NYT.

Damn it for not working at tiffanyteen.com... uh...nevermind... nothing to see here...

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by christ:
So couldn't something similar have been done for Afghanistan?

Do you mean the Taliban regime? Al-Queda's activities? Either way, the answer is yes, probably. Provided you can get the members of the Security Council to agree (a big IF) there isn't much they can't do in the "international peace and security" area.

Of course, you still have to catch the people you want to try, which still requires the use of force (or a cooperative local government). Otherwise, you would have a court with nobody to try.

That's one of the problems with the Yugoslav tribunal. There are indictments out there for people that nobody seems to be able to catch. An indictment against Bin Laden is pretty pointless if you can't find him (assuming he is alive, which I personally doubt).

[thunderous_funker]

I guess I'd have to hear the actual material that was broadcast before I could really decide if it crossed the line of free speech into incitement.

Its a gray area and I certainly appreciate that the critics of this decision would question where to draw that line. However, I am also certain that there is a point at which speech becomes a weapon. Especially when talking about mass media.

Consider the anti-Jew propoganda of Nazi Germany. Certainly that goes well beyond the realm of free speech. Especially in the hands of those who control the mass media.

[christ]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
Do you mean the Taliban regime? Al-Queda's activities? Either way, the answer is yes, probably. Provided you can get the members of the Security Council to agree (a big IF) there isn't much they can't do in the "international peace and security" area.

Of course, you still have to catch the people you want to try, which still requires the use of force (or a cooperative local government). Otherwise, you would have a court with nobody to try.

That's one of the problems with the Yugoslav tribunal. There are indictments out there for people that nobody seems to be able to catch. An indictment against Bin Laden is pretty pointless if you can't find him (assuming he is alive, which I personally doubt).

Yes, but it would have been (could still be?) a great way round the Guantanamo Bay fiasco - the US has done the 'find and capture' bit, albeit a tad coarsely, and if they had pressurised the UN (who were, after all, behind the Afghanistan conflict) then this sort of thing could have been set up and all parties would have been winners. The UN (and Troll and I) would stop whining about the Gitmo abuse, and the US gets the prisoners off of their hands with face still maintained. Sounds 'win-win' to me.

[sanity assassin]

Originally posted by christ:
So couldn't something similar have been done for Afghanistan?

I wonder, maybe also bring charges against those supporting those regimes violating the convention. Hey, that means the US will be up in the dock.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by christ:
Yes, but it would have been (could still be?) a great way round the Guantanamo Bay fiasco - the US has done the 'find and capture' bit, albeit a tad coarsely, and if they had pressurised the UN (who were, after all, behind the Afghanistan conflict) then this sort of thing could have been set up and all parties would have been winners. The UN (and Troll and I) would stop whining about the Gitmo abuse, and the US gets the prisoners off of their hands with face still maintained. Sounds 'win-win' to me.

Only if you don't confuse revenge for justice. I fear that many people do.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
I guess I'd have to hear the actual material that was broadcast before I could really decide if it crossed the line of free speech into incitement.

I haven't heard the broadcasts (and anyway, I don't speak French), but I understand that radio broadcasts did more than incite the genocide. The broadcasts basically coordinated it down to telling people were to find individual Tutsis to kill. Those broadcasts started in coordination with the assassination of the Rwandan and Burundian presidents, and the killing of the Rwandan PM and his Belgian peacekeeper bodyguards.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by sanity assassin:
I wonder, maybe also bring charges against those supporting those regimes violating the convention. Hey, that means the US will be up in the dock.

Why does some idiot have to blame the US for everything? Rwanda is a former Belgian colony and maintained close ties both with Belgium and with France. There was never any US "support" or interest. Rwanda is about as impoverished and out of the way as they come. The US never had the slightest interest in it.

However, to be clear, while Rwanda's closest ties were (and are) with Belgium and France, they aren't responsible either. Rwandan Hutus did this horrible thing all by themselves. The responsibility lies with the genocideers, which is why this court was set up.

[Lerkfish]

I'm not familiar enough with the actual transmissions and broadcasts to form an opinion on the specific case, but to the issue, I think this is a bizarre area to determine fault.

Mob psychosis is a complicated phenonmena, I'm not sure you can absolutely attribute it ONLY to broadcast propaganda, for that reason. There have to be a variety of factors besides information, or else you'd have to convict the media for the rodney king riots as well -- when obviously it was the nature of the verdict, the history of police brutality and perceived racism, etc, etc, that all made the powder keg ready to light in the first place.

Similarly, Rwanda, was not absent of tribal hatreds long before the broadcasts. I doubt the broadcasts, in and of themselves, created a desire for genocide that did not exist previously.

They bear some responsibility to report responsibly, but to hold them responsible for public peace seems a convenient scapegoating of anyone instead the government and police, who are actually charged with keeping the peace.

now, remember, I haven't heard these broadcasts, so I'm just discussing the issue in general.

I also agree that even if justified in this case, it will be a dangerous precedent to set. Without too much imagination, just look on these boards and remember people blaming the liberal press for reporting the war in a non cheerleader capacity? Wouldn't be too much of a stretch to condemn them and start blaming them for casualties....and down that road is a state-controlled press. Not sure we or any country really wants that.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
I haven't heard the broadcasts (and anyway, I don't speak French), but I understand that radio broadcasts did more than incite the genocide. The broadcasts basically coordinated it down to telling people were to find individual Tutsis to kill. Those broadcasts started in coordination with the assassination of the Rwandan and Burundian presidents, and the killing of the Rwandan PM and his Belgian peacekeeper bodyguards.

Sounds pretty open and shut to me. I welcome the precedent, in that case. Just as I will support challenges to government intimidation of legitimate free speech under the rationalization that its "incitement" which is certain to happen in the not so distant future.

And I think sanity_assassin was talking about Afghanistan, not Rwanda when he hinted that the court investigations might lead to people in the US.

[christ]

Originally posted by Lerkfish:
...I also agree that even if justified in this case, it will be a dangerous precedent to set. Without too much imagination, just look on these boards and remember people blaming the liberal press for reporting the war in a non cheerleader capacity? Wouldn't be too much of a stretch to condemn them and start blaming them for casualties....and down that road is a state-controlled press. Not sure we or any country really wants that.

We hung Lord Haw-Haw, and all he was doing was taunting.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Lerkfish:
I'm not familiar enough with the actual transmissions and broadcasts to form an opinion on the specific case, but to the issue, I think this is a bizarre area to determine fault.

Are you thinking that the entire thing is being blamed on these three? That's not the case. The Genocide Convention outlaws a number of things and incitement to genocide is one of them. But obviously there are other cases going on.

There is an interesting question about how you differentiate between genocide and murder when you have hundreds of thousands of genocideers. Genocide is (among other things) the intent to kill an entire population or a significant portion of a population. That happened in Rwanda, but the killing was done by a huge number of people. If someone kills 2 or 3 people, is is just murder, or is it genocide? It seems to me to be genocide when it is coordinated. And that points back to the broadcasters who didn't wield the machetes, but did organize the killing.

[Lerkfish]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
I haven't heard the broadcasts (and anyway, I don't speak French), but I understand that radio broadcasts did more than incite the genocide. The broadcasts basically coordinated it down to telling people were to find individual Tutsis to kill. Those broadcasts started in coordination with the assassination of the Rwandan and Burundian presidents, and the killing of the Rwandan PM and his Belgian peacekeeper bodyguards.

you posted this while I was formulating my response further down...after reading this, it prompted me to do a google search, and found this more complete detailing

But, when I read this, it sounds more to me like there already was a group that intended to foster genocide, and then created a radio network with the express purpose to do just that.
That DOES deserve to be prosecuted, but that is hardly legitimate press or broadcasting. My fear is that this case implies they were legitimate journalists who simply acted irresponsibly, when it sounds more like thugs who commandeered a radio network.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
And I think sanity_assassin was talking about Afghanistan, not Rwanda when he hinted that the court investigations might lead to people in the US.

That's still loopy.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Lerkfish:
you posted this while I was formulating my response further down...after reading this, it prompted me to do a google search, and found this more complete detailing

But, when I read this, it sounds more to me like there already was a group that intended to foster genocide, and then created a radio network with the express purpose to do just that.
That DOES deserve to be prosecuted, but that is hardly legitimate press or broadcasting. My fear is that this case implies they were legitimate journalists who simply acted irresponsibly, when it sounds more like thugs who commandeered a radio network.

Thanks for the link.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by christ:
We hung Lord Haw-Haw, and all he was doing was taunting.

That was for treason. He broadcasted from Germany on behalf of the German Government while his country was at war with Germany. This is a different thing.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
That's still loopy.

Depends on the charges, IMO. Different crimes, different levels of complicity, different charges.

Then again, I think arms dealers should be held accountable for who they sells arms to. I'm just a radical, I guess.

[christ]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
That was for treason. He broadcasted from Germany on behalf of the German Government while his country was at war with Germany. This is a different thing.

I know. I was being flippant. I shouldn't.

[Spliffdaddy]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
Why does some idiot have to blame the US for everything? Rwanda is a former Belgian colony and maintained close ties both with Belgium and with France. There was never any US "support" or interest. Rwanda is about as impoverished and out of the way as they come. The US never had the slightest interest in it.

However, to be clear, while Rwanda's closest ties were (and are) with Belgium and France, they aren't responsible either. Rwandan Hutus did this horrible thing all by themselves. The responsibility lies with the genocideers, which is why this court was set up.

*SMACKDOWN*

[voodoo]

quote from article

"This case would have been laughed out of an American court"

Bwahahahahahhahah!

Who cares? Next!

[voodoo]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
An indictment against Bin Laden is pretty pointless if you can't find him (assuming he is alive, which I personally doubt).

Is that a known unknown or an unknown unknown?

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally posted by voodoo:
Is that a known unknown or an unknown unknown?

Known unknown.

It would be an unknown unknown if we didn't even know if some form of leadership figure existed at all, since then, we wouldn't even know to ask about bin Laden at all.

The concept isn't that difficult to grasp.

-s*

[voodoo]

Originally posted by Spheric Harlot:
Known unknown.

It would be an unknown unknown if we didn't even know if some form of leadership figure existed at all, since then, we wouldn't even know to ask about bin Laden at all.

The concept isn't that difficult to grasp.

-s*

There is no concept to grasp. There is only one kind of unknown. That would be the "uknown".

If there was such a thing as a 'known unknown' then logically there would be a 'unknown known'. It is logically impossible so stop this nonsense.

[christ]

In the phrase 'known unknown', it is not the thing that is 'unknown' that is known'. What is 'known' is that something is 'unknown'. An 'unknown unknown' is something that no-one is aware of, and in normal (as opposed to politician) speech would be called an 'imponderable' or similar.

I know that Steven King writes books, and he has written a certain number, but I don't know how many. That is a 'known unknown'. This has an answer.

An author that I have never heard of may or may not exist, and he or she may or may not have written any books. That is an 'unknown unknown'. This may not have an answer.

Logically there is a difference.

Next tutorial is on 'countably' vs 'uncountably' infinite, for those that are still awake.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Presumably a known unknown would be like X in an equation. I know it's there, I just can't quantify it.

This is why people like me go to Law School.

[voodoo]

Originally posted by christ:
In the phrase 'known unknown', it is not the thing that is 'unknown' that is known'. What is 'known' is that something is 'unknown'. An 'unknown unknown' is something that no-one is aware of, and in normal (as opposed to politician) speech would be called an 'imponderable' or similar.

I know that Steven King writes books, and he has written a certain number, but I don't know how many. That is a 'known unknown'. This has an answer.

An author that I have never heard of may or may not exist, and he or she may or may not have written any books. That is an 'unknown unknown'. This may not have an answer.

Logically there is a difference.

Next tutorial is on 'countably' vs 'uncountably' infinite, for those that are still awake.

I'm sorry that is where I disagree. Logically there isn't a difference. See, here is why:

(x is any equation any number anything really)

1. f(x)=x

2. g(v)=g(f(x))

In equation 1 there is no premise. x can be *anything*.

In equation 2 there is a premise that f(x) is v in g(v). However that makes g(v) anything - just like x although g(v) is not x.

(nobody I mean NOBODY can possibly be awake now christ - quick let's mug 'em before they wake up)

So even if you have an equation [g(v)] that relates to x and is therefore never = x (or always if g(v) = x of course g(v) = f(x) naturally) it is still just as unknown. You may feel there is a difference but trust me. Thare ain't no such thing.

There are the things we (think we) know and then there are the things we don't know.

*********************************************

Now I have from the beginning - since I heard Rummy say those words - recognize them for what they are. Confusing spinning on things.
You just bought into the spinning. That was a classic example of sounding logical, sounding even wise (because you just bullshitted i.e. confused 99% of your audience) and spinning a question to hell.

We have a minister of agrigulture here that is quite the master of spinning. Yep. Agriculture.

He was asked what his policy on the protective tolls and tariffs on imported vegetables was and he replied "Vegetables, yes. I remember my first vegetetable. It was a cucumber. Vegetebles are good for you. They are very important part of a nutritious meal. When I was young we didn't have many kinds of vegetables..."



**********************************************

On your book/author example well...

A question that can probably be answered is a known unknown?

And one that can't is an unknown unknown? Interesting.

However you don't really know which question can be answered until you look for the answer. Think about this. I sure have. A lot.

[Sven G]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
Presumably a known unknown would be like X in an equation. I know it's there, I just can't quantify it.

This is why people like me go to Law School.

OK - then, maybe one could try to qualify it...? (The X.)

Actually, the world would be a lot better if people tried to qualify things, instead of merely quantifying them!

Maybe stating the obvious - but anyway...

[voodoo]

Originally posted by Sven G:

Actually, the world would be a lot better if people tried to qualify things, instead of merely quantifying them!

We need to be told the obvious too. Else we stop believing that it is obvious because no one says it!

[christ]

In general, once we know that a thing can be done, we can work out how to do it relatively easily. Until we know that it can be done, or someone posits its possibility, it can't be done.

But in general I agree that Rummy had tied himself into knots, and he would, in hindsight have rather said something other than what he actually said. But it seems a shame to pick on him just because he is inarticulate, when, if we think about it, we all know what he really meant.

[Lerkfish]

Originally posted by christ:
In general, once we know that a thing can be done, we can work out how to do it relatively easily. Until we know that it can be done, or someone posits its possibility, it can't be done.

But in general I agree that Rummy had tied himself into knots, and he would, in hindsight have rather said something other than what he actually said. But it seems a shame to pick on him just because he is inarticulate, when, if we think about it, we all know what he really meant.

Actually, If I recall correctly (If I'm not, someone please correct me), that line and that press conference, he was intentionally stonewallling because the reporter had asked something he didn't want to answer with specifics....it was the location of WMDs.

NOW, in hindsight, we all KNOW why he didn't want to answer with specifics, because there weren't any.

[christ]

Originally posted by Lerkfish:
Actually, If I recall correctly (If I'm not, someone please correct me), that line and that press conference, he was intentionally stonewallling because the reporter had asked something he didn't want to answer with specifics....it was the location of WMDs.

NOW, in hindsight, we all KNOW why he didn't want to answer with specifics, because there weren't any.

As I recall he was saying that the US should invade even though they had no evidence of WMDs existence, because, as he put it : "...There is another way to phrase that, and that is that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."