French Journalist Florence Hartmann Jailed by War Crimes Tribunal

[Bradical79]

Source: The Gaurdian

The journalist Florence Hartmann, a former correspondent for Le Monde, has been jailed at the war crimes tribunal in The Hague, the body established to try the criminals she devoted her life to exposing.

Hartmann’s lawyer said she was being held in isolation, under 24-hour fluorescent light, a situation that will last until at least Tuesday because of the Easter holiday.

In a private phone call from detention yesterday she said that she was in the bizarre position of “watching General Ratko Mladić [the accused Bosnian Serb military leader] walking around the yard and associating with other prisoners while I’m locked away in a cage. The outrageous thing was to see the UN and Dutch police kick away women from Srebrenica and survivors from the camps who were trying to protect me from arrest, after all they’ve been through.”

Hartmann was convicted of contempt of court in 2009 for revealing in a book that the tribunal had withheld crucial information on the Srebrenica massacre of 1995 from the nearby international court of justice. The conviction was later upheld on appeal.

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/law/2016/mar/26/french-journalist-florence-hartmann-jailed-by-war-crimes-tribunal--srebrenica-massacre

[forest444]

1. In other words, a political prisoner.

And for what? For exposing what everyone and their brother already knows?

Shame on The Hague.

[Bradical79]

8. Yes, it's disgusting

And undermines what credibility the court has. It's not only a blatantly corrupt and petty action, but dangerous beyond this case as well.

[blackspade]

2. WTF?

That is bullshit.
and this Easter weekend crap....well The Hague shows its true colors as a bureaucratic farse.

[christx30]

3. This is why the US refuses to join the ICC. Crap like this. n/t

[cstanleytech]

5. On the other hand the US government cannot throw stones at the ICC either

but that applies to almost every government also because almost every government has done things that it knows are unethical and or illegal at one time or another.

[Ford_Prefect]

6. No it is not. It has to do with war crimes committed in Iraq and elsewhere by US contractors,

Agents of various Intel organs, military troops and commanders, senior officials like Dick Cheney, and especially torture committed by them under policy handed down by those agents and officials. That is why the G.W.Bush Government refused to sign any agreements to be bound by the ICC. The continuing presence of many of those same personnel inside the State Dept, Intel Agencies, contracting firms and Military command structure is the principle reason we still are not bound by the ICC.

The ICC is far from perfect as this terrible event shows. However, it remains a crime that no US person can be examined for war crimes by an independent authority with international reach.

see also: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016149070

[dchill]

7. So much note accurate.

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

9. Yep...

...I recall that.

[TeamPooka]

4. K&R!

[truebrit71]

10. Absolutely outrageous...

Nothing more than ass-covering by the bureaucrats in robes....