Sierra Leone Special Court's Narrow Focus

FREETOWN, Sierra Leone -- Behind concrete barriers topped with coils of razor wire sits an experiment in international justice, the Special Court for Sierra Leone. Built to accommodate a public accounting of atrocities committed during the latter years of the West African nation's civil war, the well-appointed courtrooms and walls of bulletproof glass form an unlikely landmark in this battered seaside capital.

The six-year-old U.N.-backed project also stands out in a country that, like many African nations that have endured intense civil strife, has a frail national justice system. It has already led to the indictment of 13 alleged war criminals, of whom five have been convicted, at a cost of more than $150 million. But not everyone in this poverty-stricken country is convinced that the money has been well spent.

Across Africa, the long arm of international justice is attempting to end a tradition of impunity and to advance the process of reconciliation. But in some cases, such as Uganda, it has complicated homegrown efforts to achieve peace accords, which often rely on a measure of amnesty for those accused of atrocities in civil wars.

Here in Sierra Leone, resentment has arisen over the millions of dollars in donor money spent on the international court. Some Sierra Leoneans say those funds could be better spent on education, health care and other pressing daily needs, or to develop a functioning national justice system that would last beyond the court's scheduled closure in 2010.

Marianna Kallon, whose right leg was amputated above the knee after she was shot during the war, and others here are also frustrated by the court's failure to punish the foot soldiers who carried out the specific crimes against them.

"I hear about it, but I don't care about it," said Kallon, 25, a mother of three who hobbles to the fortresslike judicial complex each day to beg for spare change.

The government of Sierra Leone and the United Nations jointly formed the Special Court in 2002, in the waning days of an 11-year civil war whose signature atrocity -- the mass amputation of the hands of civilians -- became an international symbol of the torment caused by West Africa's many conflicts.

The war ended at a time when momentum was building to bring international standards of justice to the prosecution of war crimes worldwide. The International Criminal Court in The Hague was also established in 2002 following models set in the 1990s by international tribunals for war crimes committed in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.

But elsewhere in Africa, the push for international tribunals has complicated the resolution of essentially national disputes.

This month, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni called on the International Criminal Court to withdraw indictments against Joseph Kony and other leaders of the Lord's Resistance Army so that traditional Ugandan courts, which emphasize compensation rather than retribution, can handle the cases. Kony has said he will sign a final peace agreement with Museveni's government only if the international court suspends its warrants.

The Special Court for Sierra Leone is a hybrid of the national and international justice systems, but some Sierra Leoneans complain that the balance of power has gradually shifted toward the foreigners who are the court's most visible officials.

Funded mostly by international donations, the court is targeting not those who actually cut off people's hands, but those who bore, in the language of the court, "greatest responsibility."