Mistaking the Tree for the Forest - On the Lumumba Trial and the Limits of Criminal Justice in Addressing Colonial Violence
Vervoort, Jérémiah Nirina
Author
aut
Text
xx#
2026
Verfassungsblog
2026-04-28
eng
More than six decades after the assassination of the first prime minister of the newly independent Congo, Patrice Lumumba, and his collaborators Maurice Mpolo and Joseph Okito, Étienne Davignon is the only defendant to stand trial before a criminal court for colonial-era war crimes. The Lumumba litigation marks a historic step forward. But it risks producing the illusion of a legally contained resolution of the colonial past – by individualizing responsibility for a structural crime and offering the Belgian state an opportunity for self-absolution.
CC BY-SA 4.0
Vervoort, Jérémiah Nirina
colonialism
Congo
Criminal Law
War Crimes
342
https://verfassungsblog.de/belgium-colonialism-lumumba/
Verfassungsblog
2366-7044
Max Steinbeis Verfassungsblog gGmbH
10.59704/d065657fae1351f6
260428
10.59704/d065657fae1351f6
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