Justice Minister: ‘Transitional justice needed to build a viable and sustainable democratic system in Sudan’

Sudan’s Minister of Justice, Nasreldin Abdelbari, has stressed the need “to achieve transitional justice* to build a viable and sustainable democratic system through the constitutional commitments derived from the Constitutional Document, and the revolutionary commitments derived from the slogan of the December Revolution, freedom, peace, and justice”.

Addressing the final consultative session on the draft law of the Transitional Justice Commission on Wednesday in Khartoum, the Minister of Justice indicated the need to protect human rights and build a future based on tolerance and a sense of safety. Pointing to cases in which human rights have been violated in the past.

The minister explained that transitional justice is a necessary condition for liberation from the past tragedies resulting from human rights violations committed during the era of government.

Abdelbari warned: “Noting that any successful and comprehensive transitional justice must include accountability, truth, reconciliation and reforming deep institutions that prevent the recurrence of past violations,” explaining that transitional justice processes that focus on reconciliation only, cannot succeed. Transitional justice processes that focus on accountability only, also cannot succeed.

He said that it would be better for the Transitional Justice Commission to be established to lead the first consultations on the concept of transitional justice and how to achieve it, and then write the law.

Abdelbari affirmed that transitional justice is a necessary condition to get rid of the congestion that inhabits our hearts and disrupts our lives, as a result of our past violations. Noting the importance of consulting on the draft transitional justice law that defines the conceptual and institutional frameworks for the transitional justice process that are related to the achievement of comprehensive justice, social peace, political stability, and a complete democratic transition.

*Transitional justice consists of judicial and non-judicial measures implemented in order to redress legacies of human rights abuses. Such measures include criminal prosecutions, truth commissions, reparations programmes, and various kinds of institutional reforms. Transitional justice is enacted at a point of political transition from violence and repression to societal stability (or at times years later) and it is informed by a society’s desire to rebuild social trust, repair a fractured justice system, and build a democratic system of governance.

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