Human Rights and International Governance

In my posting of July 30, I wrote about the pending extradition case against former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori (see “ Breaking the Culture of Impunity”). At the time, Fujimori was under house arrest in Chile. He had been detained by Chilean authorities at the request of the Peruvian government (just to recap: in 2001, a Peruvian judge had issued a detention order against him for his alleged role in the abuses and killings committed by the “Colina Group,” a particularly abusive unit of Peru’s Military Intelligence Service). Back in July, many observers – including myself – were not hopeful that Fujimori would ever be brought to justice, the principal reason being that a lower court in Chile had ruled against his extradition back to Peru. Thankfully, my pessimism was misplaced, or at least it appears to have been. Just this last week, Chile’s Supreme Court overturned the decision, ruling that Fujimori must be sent back to Peru to face charges of human rights violations and corruption. Given Chile’s own struggles with transitional justice, the decision is particularly welcome.
     Nonetheless, justice will not be easy to obtain. Any trial will likely be highly politicized, even polarizing. We’re already seeing signs of this: Fujimori himself has cried foul, suggesting that the charges against him are politically motivated, and Peruvians themselves are deeply divided about the former President. It is not inconceivable that violence could erupt between pro- and anti-Fujimori factions, the net result being that his trial could have a destabilizing effect on the country (see Globe and Mail article “ Fujimori must be tried in Peru, Chile’s top court says”). Moreover, it is not yet clear how strong the prosecution’s case is against him, and Fujimori has yet to be convicted of any wrongdoing. He, like everyone else, has the right to a fair and open trial; anything less would be a miscarriage of justice.
     Even so, the fact that Fujimori will be having his day in court represents an important step forward in the larger struggle against impunity. When former Chilean President General Augusto Pinochet was arrested in Britain in 1998 for human rights abuses former Heads of State took notice. Prior to his arrest, former leaders had been granted diplomatic immunity; afterwards, they no longer had an automatic “get out of jail free” card. Still, since the Pinochet affair few heads of state have been held to account for the human rights violations that they had a hand in, either directly or indirectly, while in office. The fact that another head of state is being brought to trial suggests that, thanks to courage of the Chilean Supreme Court, the world may be a little bit closer to seeing the day when no one is above the law.

The opinions expressed are the personal views of the author only, and do not represent the views of any organization or institution with which he is affiliated.