UN Mechanism President Calls for Protection of Rwanda Genocide Witnesses

Judge Graciela Gatti Santana, president of the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals, presented its fourteenth annual report to the UN General Assembly in New York. She stressed the UN’s obligations to uphold the fundamental rights of convicted people and provide judicial protection for the thousands of victims and witnesses who testified in cases related to the Rwanda genocide. Santana also backed keeping decisions on pardons, sentence commutations and early release at the international level, and said a Security Council resolution is needed to implement the Mechanism’s plan for concluding its work.