Auditorium Ivan Pictet
Maison de la paix, Geneva

Lunch will be available for attendees from 12:00.

Moderator:

• Päivi Kairamo, Ambassador, Permanent Representative of Finland to the United Nations, Geneva

Speakers:

• Ruth McCoy, Executive Director, Kofi Annan Foundation
• David Tolbert, President, International Center for Transitional Justice

Discussant:

• Frank Halderman, Professor of Law, Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights

In November 2013, the International Centre for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) and the Kofi Annan Foundation, with funding support from the Government of Finland, organized a high level symposium in New York that focussed on what seems like a singular paradox.

Truth commissions created after armed conflicts have tended towards uniformity in their mandates even though awareness of the complex challenges facing such commissions has become increasingly evident. Despite increased awareness of these issues, several truth-seeking processes have gone through near-paralyzing crises.

In the light of experience and practice, the symposium re-examined assumptions about how truth commissions are established and what makes them operate effectively. In this connection, participants took seriously a rule that is often expressed, but not always applied: there is no universal formula that will fit every possible situation.

The proceedings of the symposium have been summed up in a report, which will be published on the 19 June in Geneva.

The reflections in this report will be useful for policy makers and practitioners alike:

• First, for peace advocates and supporters of negotiated settlements who envision truth-seeking as part of a peacebuilding process and who need to know what challenges their proposals are likely to face, from inception to implementation;
• Secondly, for human rights defenders and victims’ activists who are anxious to ensure those peace settlements and other forms of political agreement do not sacrifice accountability or victims’ rights for the sake of convenience; and
• Thirdly, for international organizations and agencies making decisions on whether to support truth telling processes, which are usually fraught with political risk, and where ideal formulas are displaced by imperfect realities.

This event is organised by the Kofi Annan Foundation and the International Center for Transitional Justice, in partnership with the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights.

Biographies:

Ambassador Päivi KAIRAMO
Permanent Representative of Finland to the UN, Geneva

Ambassador Kairamo has been the Permanent Representative of Finland States to the Office of the United Nations and Other International Organizations in Geneva since July 2012. Her previous role was as Ambassador of the UN and Global Affairs Unit from April to July 2012. She has previously held several positions within the Office of the President of the Republic of Finland both as Secretary General and Chief of the Cabinet of the President and as Diplomatic Advisor and Member of the Cabinet of the President. She was also based in Brussels as Administrator (official) of DG Employment and Social Affairs from 2000 to 2005 and previously as a Counsellor in Finland’s Permanent Mission to the EU from 1998 to 2000. She has also held positions within the Ministry of Labour of Finland. She has a Master of Law (LLM) from the University of Helsinki, Finland.

Ruth McCoy
Executive Director, Kofi Annan Foundation

David Tolbert
President, International Center for Transitional Justice

David Tolbert was appointed president of the International Center for Transitional Justice in 2010. Previously he served as Registrar of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon and Assistant Secretary-General and Special Expert to the UN Secretary-General on UN Assistance to the Khmer Rouge Trials. From 2004 to 2008 he served as Deputy Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). He was also the ICTY’s Deputy Registrar and Chef de Cabinet to ICTY President Gabrielle Kirk McDonald. Mr. Tolbert was Jennings Randolph Senior Fellow at the US Institute of Peace. In 2008 and 2009, he served as a member of the American Society of International Law Task Force on United States Policy Toward the International Criminal Court.

Professor Frank Haldemann
Professor of Law, Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights

Frank Haldemann holds a PhD in Law from the University of Zurich as well as an LL.M. from the London School of Economics and Political Science. After having worked as a legal researcher within the Independent Commission of Experts Switzerland - Second World War (“Commission Bergier”), Professor Haldemann has been a Visiting Fellow in the US (Center for Human Rights and Global Justice, New York University School of Law), in the Netherlands (The Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies, Université de Leyde, Campus La Haye) as well as in South Africa (Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria). He has been an invited professor at different universities (University of Leiden, Università degli Studi di Sassari and Université Catholique de Louvain).

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