After the Rwandan genocide, the country struggled to implement justice and provide the closure needed to rebuild the social structure of the country. In 2002, the government decided to use community based Gacaca courts to try the majority of cases in order to expedite the justice process. This Human Rights Watch report analyzes the use of community-based courts for handling post-conflict justice. While critics argue that Gacaca courts may be more corrupt, they have been able to process more cases than the normal court system would have been able to handle.
May 31, 2011
This report assesses the courts’ achievements and outlines a number of serious shortcomings in their work, including corruption and procedural irregularities. The report also examines the government’s decision to transfer genocide-related rape cases to the gacaca courts and to exclude from their jurisdiction crimes committed by soldiers of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), the country’s ruling party since the genocide ended in July 1994.
Read the full report .