Justice: OPEN LETTER TO Mr. L. MORENO- OCAMPO, THE ICC PROSECUTOR

Le 22 juin 2011 par IvoireBusiness - Dear Prosecutor,
I do congratulate you for the opportunity given (June 2011) to the Ivorian victims to bring their cases before the International

Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.
However, I shall disappoint you in the following lines of my letter for many reasons:
1-the gap of thirty days is very insufficient when we all know that the large part of the victims or/and their relatives capable to deal with their cases are either in refugee camps in the neighboring countries or they are scattered across the country.
2-it is not easy to everyone to find a legal representative, even the time of peace. People have lost everything; therefore they cannot afford to pay for a legal representative to take their cases. Their first instinct is their survival (security, food, water and place to sleep in).
3-many judges have left the country. For, most of them are in the radar of the new authorities who are getting rid of anyone suspected to be a pro-Gbagbo. In this situation, even if they were to come back and take the cases of the victims, could you seriously, dear Prosecutor, say that they would work fairly and that their own security would be guaranteed?
4-the new authorities do not control anything. The warlords have the country in their hands.
5-the populations are afraid to come out. In many regions of the country, the populations have not returned to their villages and towns.
6-travelling through the country is hellish. On the top of their fare, the ones who dare to travel need extra money to pay their way through the barriers controlled by the rebels forced that kidnapped President Gbagbo.
7-the new authorities are witnessing and encouraging one of the biggest ethnic cleansing. So, in this chaotic situation, who do you think, dear Prosecutor, would be very brave and point out his/her aggressor?
8-the country resembles a Western movie. Guns are in the hands of the rebels and they are terrorizing the civilians. Who would dare in these circumstances to raise his/her little finger and say he/she witnessed any abuses?
In the end, dear Prosecutor, with all due respect, I shall say that the time span given to the Ivoirian victims to bring any cases before the ICC should be bigger than the one given (30 days).
And I would like to ask why such a rush, if there is no any hidden agenda behind the time given? Would it be right to ask whether there is any pressure or any political issues someone from somewhere would like to hide or to profit from by giving only thirty days to a victim to bring his/her case before an international court that he/she has never dreamt of before? How long did it take to the ICC to bring Mr Bemba (RDC) to justice? How long did it take to bring Mr Charles Taylor and the Bosnian General and his companions to justice? So why thirty days only to the thousands of victims Mr Dramane’s presidency needed as sacrifices?
For the respect of the ICC and to avoid giving another opportunity to the critiques of the Court, I shall modestly invite you to reconsider the thirty (30) days that have been set for the victims of Mr Dramane, the UN and France to overcome their trauma and at the same time to embrace the meanders of the International Criminal Court.
Best regards.

SYLVAIN DE BOGOU