Ratification of Rome Statute by Guatemalan Congress

Impunity Watch welcomes the ratification of the Rome Statute by the Guatemalan Congress and additionally welcomes the recent progress achieved in the Ixil Genocide case.
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Breaking the wave: critical steps in the fight against crime in Guatemala

New report points to critical steps that must be taken for Guatemala to overcome its plague of criminal violence.
Impunity Watch and the Conflict Research Unit of the Clingendael Institute today jointly publish a major new report detailing the immense challenges faced by the Guatemalan criminal justice system as a new right-wing government takes power in the country.

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One vacancy at IW

IW is looking for a Research Coordinator (Principal Researcher) for our Burundi Programme, based in Burundi.
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Santa Lucía book presentation

On 25 September 2011 IW and Solidaridad presented a remembrance book in the "Doopsgezinde kerk" in Haarlem. The book tells the story of 30 men and women from Santa Lucía Cotzumalguapa, Guatemala who disappeared or were killed during the 36-year internal conflict.
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Understanding The Role Of Memory Initiatives In Communities Struggling With Impunity

Debating in the Netherlands
with youth, experts and policy-makers
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The Persistence of Truth

This report looks at progress in truth-seeking and the combat of impunity in Guatemala ten years after its UN-backed truth comission, the Commission for Historical Clarification (CEH), published its findings on the events of the internal armed confrontation of 1960-96.
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WHAT WE DO

IMPUNITY WATCH PERSPECTIVES

Impunity Watch’s Perspectives Programme connects local efforts to deal with impunity throughout the world by pursuing comparative research and international policy and advocacy work. Our aim here is to promote greater innovation in transitional justice policy-making, using comparative analysis of the experiences of different countries to critique interventions that, too often, fail to respond adequately to the situation at hand.

We pursue this aim in two ways:

we encourage exchange of knowledge and experience among those at the frontline of the combat of impunity in different countries, helping to break down the barriers to comparative learning among them, and use of such lessons in designing interventions;
we identify key international policy actors and debates, and produce targeted briefs and advocacy efforts based on our comparative observations, seeking thus to inform and influence policy-making on aspects of impunity reduction as it relates to different countries and international mechanisms.

We implement these strategies in two ways:

Thematic Projects: by addressing in-depth a small number of specific themes, selected for their importance and treatment, and producing research data, comparative analysis and policy recommendations aimed at national, regional and international levels;
International Impunity Briefs: by identifying and exploiting opportunities, as they emerge, among international actors and debates, to raise individual policy issues, drawing on the range of findings produced through ongoing comparison of country-focus and thematic Perspectives project research findings.

This programme is oriented towards providing a constructive critique of the transitional justice paradigm, in terms of how it meets the challenge of impunity reduction.

Three thematic Perspectives projects have been developed to date, with implementation of two of these now underway. They involve research in multiple countries, followed by policy-making, advocacy, outreach and exchange elements. All of Impunity Watch’s country-based programmes and projects are to be integrated, thus achieving additional benefits for both aspects of our work.

In addition, comparative analysis of research findings from Guatemala and Serbia is also being developed, drawing out lessons and best practices on a range of aspects of transitional justice, in particular in relation to truth-seeking and criminal prosecutions. This shall form the basis for Impunity Watch’s International Impunity Briefs.