Rianne Letschert

Tilburg University | UVT · International Victimology Institute Tilburg "INTERVICT"

This article investigates the approach to reparations of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), doctrinal comparative law perspective, complemented by socio-legal insights. We trace back the development of the reparative frameworks of the ICC and ECCC, and identify the normative bases...

Twenty years ago, the International Criminal Court (hereinafter ICC or the Court) was established holding the aim of placing victims at the heart of international criminal justice proceedings and delivering justice to them through, among others, reparations. Article 75 of the Rome Statute lays out the reparations regime, and, in practice, court-ord...

This chapter discusses six factors, addressed throughout the book, that stand out as crucial for rendering victim participation in criminal justice meaningful: cultural awareness, accessible application mechanisms, effective communication, effective protective measures, accessible psychological assistance and reparations. The chapter also puts inte...

This article develops a victimological perspective on international criminal justice, based on a review of the main victimological characteristics of international crimes: the complicity of government agencies, the large numbers of victims involved and the peculiar position of victims of international crimes, who at the time of the commission of th...

An abundance of scholarly literature exists on reparation theories and legal procedures or administrative programmes set up to provide reparation to victims of mass atrocities or international crimes, oft en also referred to as gross violations of human rights and humanitarian law. This article aims to provide an analysis of what we consider to be...

This book documents the magnitude of this “unjust side of globalization.” It discusses how globalization victimizes ordinary people and how recent improvements in the protection of victims of crime are compromized by the same processes. On the positive side globalization may create a new sensitivity to victimhood in far away corners. This chapter p...

INTRODUCTION In Rwanda: Death, Despair and Defiance, African Rights (1994) described the horrific cruelties against and killings of Tutsi and moderate Hutu by extremist Hutu over a period of a few months only (see also Ruvebana, this volume). In 1994, the beautiful country of Rwanda – also known as the country of one thousand hills – was engulfed b...

The aim of this chapter is firstly to analyze implementation difficulties of victims’ rights focusing in particular on victims of international crimes and victims of cross-border victimization. This will be followed by an analysis of global or multi-level governance structures in this field and some first proposals will be made to adjust existing v...

The various chapters in this book can be read as examples of the blatantly unjust sides of globalization. They testify how processes of globalization are producing increasing numbers of victims of old and new forms of transnational or international crimes. Due to increased mobility and the use of Internet, residents of one country can more easily t...

The past 25 years mark a period of transition in Dutch criminal procedure. A quarter century ago, victims of crime had a very limited role to play in the framework of criminal justice. The situation was governed by the Code of Criminal Procedure, which entered into force in 1926. This Code more or less ‘intrumentalised’ the position of the victim....

Victimology as an academic discipline has achieved a lot by bridging concepts stemming from different academic disciplines such as law, psychology, traumatology and criminology, and by studying how to develop adequate victim-centred legislation and policy as well as effective evidence-based psycho-social intervention programmes. What is often refer...

The large-scale terrorist attacks on 9/11 resulted in more attention being devoted to victims of terrorist acts. Discussions took place on how their needs could be best accommodated. The Madrid bombings in March 2004 gave further impetus to this process. This development is also part of a recent trend towards general victim of crime policies that b...

As demonstrated in Chapters 3 and 4, terrorism is capable of inflicting widespread personal injury, and unprecedented property and financial damage.1 Especially the 9/11 aftermath has led to a worldwide academic and political discussion on how to compensate victims of future terrorist acts.2 The debate concentrates on (a) the availability of (defau...

It is generally known that criminal justice systems around the world feature vast differences. They vary from strictly adversarial systems (e.g. in Anglo-Saxon countries) to more inquisitorial systems in many jurisdictions on mainland Europe. No matter the incompatibilities between the various systems, nowadays they have one thing in common; they a...

The fight against terrorism is receiving increased attention due to recent worldwide large-scale terrorist acts. Long overdue, and at least since the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 in New York and Washington, attention has also been directed to victims of terrorism. However, there is no international legally binding instrument that sufficie...

Victimization in a multidisciplinary key is relevant for academics and practitioners in the domain of juridical, forensic, criminological and psychological victimology, who share an interest in the current state of the art. The focus of this edited volume is on four trends relating to: the victims’ rights explosion, expanding evidence-based knowled...

Although terrorism has already featured on the international agenda for many years, attention to the plight of victims of terrorism has been conspicuous in its absence until fairly recently. The policy response to terrorism in most states was mainly restricted to adjusting police tactics and criminal procedural laws for organized crime to the new d...

The core document so far in the field of the protection of victims' rights is the Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power, adopted in 1985 by the UN General Assembly. Starting from the notion that this is a declaration only, it was suggested by some to develop a victims' rights convention, aiming to improv...

Since the beginning of the 1990s, the institution of the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities (the ‘High Commissioner’) has acquired a considerable prestige in the area of conflict prevention. Even though the High Commissioner is primarily, or even exclusively, aiming at the prevention of conflicts relating to national minority issues, it...

At the annual session in Edinburgh in 2004, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly called on the High Commissioner on National Minorities to 'initiate a comparative study of the integration policies of established democracies and analyse the effect on the position of new minorities.' The High Commissioner followed up this request, and asked the Migration...