Publication

This paper describes how from 2000 to 2005 the UN-sponsored tribunal in East Timor sought to achieve accountability for violence associated with the 1999 vote for independence from Indonesia. The author explains that the East Timor tribunal represents a virtual textbook case of how not to create, manage and administer a "hybrid" justice process. The paper states that the tribunal was handicapped from the beginning by a debilitating lack of resources, an unclear mandate, inadequate recruitment, ineffective management by a peacekeeping mission that had other priorities, and above all a lack of political will at both the UN headquarters and at the mission level. The author explains that because the UN may risk repeating some of the same mistakes in Cambodia, it is particularly important to assess the failings of the East Timor trials.