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Part I - The Debate on Amnesties

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 May 2010

Mark Freeman
Affiliation:
International Crisis Group, Brussels
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Summary

INTRODUCTION

This part of the book offers an extended analysis of the law and policy considerations concerning amnesties that encompass human rights crimes. It begins with technical analysis and then becomes more polemical. The goal is to deepen debate on both the overt and underlying complexities of the topic, bringing new issues to the fore and reexamining old issues through a different lens. It is the gray areas that are of special interest in this field and the areas where the most important debates still need to occur.

The discussion comprises five sections. The first section offers a definition of the term amnesty, including analysis of its distinctive features as a legal instrument. For purposes of conceptual clarity, comparisons will be made between amnesties and other legal instruments that have the effect of displacing individual criminal accountability, including pardons, statutes of limitation, and the various types of standing immunities recognized in treaties and domestic legislation. By understanding the specificity of amnesty as a legal instrument, the subsequent analyses are situated in their proper technical context.

The second section offers an assessment of amnesty in the context of the fight against impunity, a theme introduced in the book's opening considerations. Here the analysis expands considerably, beginning with an examination of the specific ways in which amnesties fit within the field of transitional justice.

Type
Chapter
Information
Necessary Evils
Amnesties and the Search for Justice
, pp. 10 - 109
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

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