From 16 to 18 June 2009, an interdisciplinary colloquium focussing on innovations and challenges of empirical and other information gathering techniques to build evidence for the prosecution of cases of sexual violence was held in The Hague. The colloquium also launched the photo-exhibition “The Men Who Killed Me” by Samer Muscati in the lobby of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which will remain until the 3rd of July.
The focus of the colloquium was on such aspects as the development of new kinds of social scientific, archival and medical data collection techniques; the development of evidence in relation to charges ranging from sexual slavery to crimes against humanity and genocide; and evidentiary and procedural differences involved in prosecuting sexual victimization in domestic versus international courts.
To meet the Colloquium’s goal of familiarizing participants from different fields with the overlapping possibilities and challenges they confront in advocating and assisting in the prosecution of sexual violence as international crime, the Colloquium featured both plenary panels and working group sessions. This included social scientists, court and aid workers, medical personnel, psychologists, journalists, and activists.
The colloquium is a joint effort by Center on Law and Globalization of the University of Illinois College of Law and American Bar Foundation in cooperation with The Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies, Leiden University/Campus The Hague and The International Victimology Institute Tilburg (INTERVICT), Tilburg University
Read the conference programme.
Read the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs report of the first day “rape as an instrument of war must not go unpunished”
Read the Grotius Centre’s review of the conference.
