ZIMBABWE: FROM IMPUNITY TO ACCOUNTABILITY
and public disclosure in a way that don’t cause additional harm to
the victim or witnesses; the search for the disappeared and proper
recovery, identification and reburial of those killed, done in
accordance with cultural rituals; an official declaration restoring the
dignity, legal and social rights of the victims and those closely
associated with them; apology and public acknowledgement of
wrongs, and the admission and acceptance of responsibility;
judicial (e.g. prosecutions) or administrative (e.g. truth
commissions) sanctions against perpetrators; commemorations
and tributes to victims; inclusion of the truth of what happened in
national and international human rights training, and in educational
materials. The abuses over all periods of the country’s history
give rise to countless examples of the absence of any form of
satisfaction to date.
·
Guarantees of non-repetition
Again this is a wide field of specific remedies, including: effective
civilian control of the military and security forces; restricting
military tribunals and in accordance with international standards;
strengthening an independent judiciary; protecting human rights
defenders, lawyers, doctors and journalists; priority training in
human rights laws and norms at all levels in society and especially
in the police, army and security services; promoting codes of
conduct and ethical norms by public servants, and in the police,
prisons service, military, media, medical and social services, and
amongst the staff of economic enterprises; monitoring and
preventing inter-social conflicts, and resolving them; law reform.
Here also it is all too apparent how far short Zimbabwe has fallen.
In the context of the above five forms of reparation, it is also
apparent how limited the ‘traditional’ remedy of civil damages is to
the problems arising from gross and systematic violations. This is
not to say of course that individual civil proceedings are irrelevant
– their potential must be included in any reparation programme –
but even at the best of times it is a slow and expensive route.
When one is dealing with large numbers of victims and many
perpetrators, all the ‘ordinary’ hazards of litigation are multiplied a
hundredfold, including the problems caused by statutes of
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