The News Review:

- FACTBOX-Sierra Leone’s war crimes court
- Q&A: Sierra Leone’s war crimes tribunal
- Economist.com | Articles by Subject | Sierra Leone

FACTBOX-Sierra Leone’s war crimes court
Reuters AlertNet – Aug 2, 2007
* The court is an international body independent of any government or organisation with a staff including Sierra Leoneans and foreigners. * It was established on Jan. 16, 2002, days before the war in Sierra Leone was declared over, to try those deemed to bear the greatest responsibility for crimes during the conflict. * Although the war started in 1991, the court’s mandate is only for crimes committed since Nov. 30, 1996, the date of a failed peace deal. * Some 50,000 people died in the war, which was notorious for amputation as a tool of war and the use of drugged-up child soldiers. * It is the first mixed tribunal of its kind, with judges appointed by the United Nations and Sierra Leone.

Q&A: Sierra Leone’s war crimes tribunal
BBC News – Aug 2, 2007
Some 50,000 people were killed and thousands more had their bodies mutilated, with government militias and the rebel Revolutionary United Front (RUF) alike accused of extreme brutality against civilians during the decade-long civil war. Who has been charged by the Special Court for Sierra Leone?…
Previously, it has been funded mainly by the US, the UK, the Netherlands and Canada. For Mr Taylor’s trial, which opened in June in The Hague and is expected to last 18 months, it said it would need about $90m. Why was Mr Taylor’s case transferred to the Netherlands? It was moved to The Hague for fear of fresh instability in Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Economist.com | Articles by Subject | Sierra Leone
economist.com – Aug 2, 2007
In order to gain access to it please either Log in, Activate your complimentary web account if you are a print subscriber, or Subscribe now Sierra Leone Elections in Sierra Leone Aug 2nd 2007 From The Economist print edition AT LEAST the presidential and parliamentary elections on August 11th will be the first to be held without the help of international peacekeepers since the end of the civil war that lashed Sierra Leone from 1991 to 2002. That is one welcome sign of progress. And since a British military intervention ended the conflict the country’s 6m people no longer run the risk of sudden death at the hands of drugged-up child soldiers. But, five years of peace and hundreds of millions of dollars of aid money later, the issues that gave rise to the war in the first place are still as much in evidence as ever. And the elections, unfortunately, are not expected to change that.