"Those of us who sustained these injuries, those of us who were amputated, we are appealing to you to sympathise with us. You know it is your arms and your legs that enable you to find food, but wherever we are, please, we ask you kindly to help us so that our children may go to school, because we are really suffering. We are nothing more than beggars."

By Heikelien Verrijn Stuart

This was the plea of one of the victims who came to testify in the Charles Taylor trial before the Special Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL) in the courtroom of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. At the ad hoc tribunals for the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Sierra Leone victims can be heard as witnesses, but there is no procedure to deal with requests for reparations.

At the ICC the role of victims is completely different. Not only can they actively participate in the proceedings, the Rome Statute also contains a wide range of possibilities for awarding reparations, including restitution, compensation and rehabilitation. The first trial against Thomas Lubanga Dyilo at the ICC started on 26 January. But it will take years before the ICC judges are able to issue an order directly against a convicted person for reparations to victims.

A Trust Fund For Victims
The ICC has a multi-facetted reparations scheme that is not widely known and still has to be put to the test. The Rome Statute created a hybrid institution. One part of the ICC is the court itself, the other part is the Trust Fund for Victims (TFV), both established in 2002.

Judges can order reparations directly against a person on the basis of a conviction. But the creation of the TFV allowed for a system of reparations which can be accessed beyond the realm of the ICC. At every stage of a trial, including the investigation, pre-trial and trial stages the Trust Fund can operate largely independent from the Court.

During its first four years the TFV had little to show apart from heartfelt lobbying by the Board of Directors. In 2007, however, the Fund sprang into action. At last an executive director was found, a secretariat was formed and reinforced. By early 2008, the Trust Fund had drafted 34 projects, almost equally divided between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and approved by the Pre-Trial Chambers.

In January, 33 contracts between the Trust Fund and its partners in the field had been signed by the Registry of the ICC, which is responsible for the administrative side of the Fund. One of these has been put on hold; another of the original projects has not been programmed, leaving 32 projects to be managed in 2009. The actual work could begin.

Two Mandates
The Trust Fund acts on the base of two mandates within the jurisdiction of the ICC and focuses on situations where the prosecutor has opened investigations.

The first mandate is linked to the procedures at the Court and allows for
implementation of reparations awards. The funds for reparation may come from money and properties collected through fines and forfeitures ordered by the Court, or from funds collected by the TFV from other outside sources.

If the Court identifies individual victims to be awarded reparations, the TFV is responsible for forwarding the awards to them. If, instead of individual awards to named beneficiaries, the Court decides that an award to a group of victims or a collective award are more appropriate, activities will be undertaken to identify groups of victims and individuals that should benefit.

The second mandate is a far more independent one. The Trust Fund may assist victims in areas under the jurisdiction of the Court without any link to the alleged crimes or suspects/perpetrators and at any stage of the proceedings. The Trust Fund has to notify the ICC about its projects. The chamber then can approve the proposed activities and is free to start its projects in the field.

If a project would pre-determine any issue to be determined by the Court, including jurisdiction, or would violate the presumption of innocence or be prejudicial to or inconsistent with the rights of the accused and a fair and impartial trial, the Court may withhold its approval. The activities developed in 2007 and the strategic plan for the period 2008-2011 show a Trust Fund moving beyond the realm of the ICC, albeit within its jurisdictional limits.

Chickens
For the moment, the Trust Fund is focussing on Uganda and the DRC. It has not been able to obtain access to the Darfur region in Sudan. In 2009 it will introduce operations in the Central African Republic. The Board of directors describes its activities as:

"Rehabilitation and reinsertion of victims, socio-economic reintegration, healing of memories, support for victims of sexual violence by counselling and micro-credit schemes, holistic community healing, non-formal education, mutual caring activities, addressing stigmatisation and ensuring peace and reconciliation, victim empowerment, livelihood support and more."

The executive director of the TFV, André Laperrière, told an audience in The
Hague last year: "We do not come with a bag of money". He sketched a concrete example. A group of women, victims of sexual assault, from a badly-damaged village community in Uganda - part of the Apungi project - were asked what they would wish for.

They told him that they used to have chickens as a source of income. Since the Trust Fund does not give money, Mr Laperrière organised a loan for a year of 200 chickens from people of another community. The women managed to build up a booming business. They were able to buy goats and planned ultimately to buy a cow. Four months before the term of the loan expired, they were able to return the original 200 chickens.

Mind Boggling
The ambitions displayed by the Trust Fund are mind-boggling. The Fund estimates that it can assist about 380,000 victims in 2008, 400,000 in 2009,
500,000 in 2010 and 600,000 in 2011. In total, the projects approved by the Pre-Trial Chamber would cost an estimated 1.8 million euros, of which about 360,000 will come from the ICC for administrative and related costs.

On 10 September 2008, the Board of Directors announced: "a global appeal for €10 million to assist 1.7 million victims of sexual violence within the jurisdiction of the ICC." In 2009 the number of projects is expected to grow to 80. The exact budget for 2009 has still to be determined.

The Trust Fund champions huge numbers of victims, but the projects will be
executed mainly through intermediaries and partners, including international and
local NGOs and a few religious organisations.

Only eight people currently work at the office of the TFV in The Hague, supported by interns and visiting professionals. In the field there is one international field officer per country and soon another field officer will be appointed per country, hired locally.

No monitor
The activities will not be monitored by the judges of the ICC or by other organs of the Court. The contracts with the NGOs are signed in good faith on the basis of the information provided by the TFV. But it is hardly feasible to expect States Parties auditors check up on the Trust Fund projects in conflict areas. Both the ICC and the TFV acknowledge that accountability of the activities in the field is a subject of concern.

The work is often done under difficult circumstances, as can been seen in DRCongo (see our story on Bakavu's project). Bungled projects, executed badly, abandoned early or mismanaged are not uncommon in the world of international NGOs and already sources at the ICC have stories to tell about experiences with money disappearing into the wrong pockets in corruption-ridden areas.

Burden or benefit?
In relation to the security issue, the ICC name is as much a burden as a benefit, according to the TFV. With regard to the situation in the DRC, the perceptions of the Court in the target areas are often characterised by endemic acts of violence and subsequently any person associated with the activities of the Court could be placed in danger.

Besides, the distinction in mandates between the Court and the Trust Fund is not properly understood by the overall population in the DRC. The Trust Fund has warned that the danger has increased since arrest warrants were issued.

Because of the need to protect the victims, the Trust Fund is reluctant to share details of the ongoing programmes and initiatives it supports, in order to protect the beneficiaries.

There are more ways in which the Trust Fund experiences the ICC as a complication to their work in the field. In rural areas often still riddled with violence, people are asked to "stand out", as André Laperrière called it, "to fill in forms and to register as a victim, eligible for participation or reparations." Besides, not only are the 17-page forms awkward tools in largely illiterate areas, they also create amorphous expectations.

Many questions can be raised about the functioning of the Trust Fund. Aren't they taking on work any local or international NGO could undertake? Will the TFV's work, being mainly delegated to NGOs, be recognised as reparations for the crimes covered by the ICC mandate? Is there any added value in the use of the brand name ICC?

How will the work of the TFV ultimately relate to the primary role of the ICC as a criminal court? Will the States Parties be able and willing to hold the TFV accountable, once it is up and running, in a transparent procedure? How will the Court manage large groups of victims claiming reparations? Won't the TFV, with its urge to assist millions of victims, raise expectations they will never be able to meet? Most of these questions will be answered by time.

(*) This article is produced in close cooperation with the International Justice Tribune (IJT). Heikelina Verrijn Stuart is a IJT correspondent.