International Criminal Court: Technology as a means to Justice
Evidence gathering for the purposes of the International Criminal Court (ICC) has proved difficult. This is because investigations are distant from the court in the Hague; a deteriorating security situation makes travel difficult; the dynamic nature of conflicts means that evidence collection must be done immediately so as to preserve it from tampering. This is where technology can play its role.
According to Google, footage available online on the Syrian civil war amounts to more hours than there has been actual war. The use of footage can be incredibly useful in helping paint an image on the ground in war zones that are inaccessible, and identifying war crimes perpetrated by any party involved. ‘User-generated’ footage is regularly utilised as a human rights advocacy tool in report generation, timeline recreations, “and other forms of data visualisations”.
From a legal context, the main issue facing user-generated footage is the ability to verify the footage as being genuine, and having a good chain of custody to meet the necessary evidentiary standards for admissibility. Considering this, Ukraine presents the perfect opportunity to improve the use of technology as the majority of the population has access to the internet.
The Eyewitness to Atrocities app, created by the International Bar Association, looks to solve the issues through allowing users to capture footage and images in an environment that meets evidentiary standards. The app has been successful in capturing verifiable footage and images that exhibit evidence of crimes being committed (war crimes, torture, genocide, crimes against humanity). A recent example of this is the collection of verifiable footage related to the Bucha mass grave.
Whilst this won’t be the first time user-generated evidence has been used, used previously to support the arrest warrant for Libyan commander Mahmoud Al-Wefalli, this will be the first time it is used on a bigger scale. It will test the ICC’s ability to deal with large amounts of information, with the hope of decreasing the amount of time it takes to collect evidence. Most importantly, it will establish the new standards of evidence gathering for future investigations.