In a new paper in the American Journal of International Law, Tom Ruys writes on the landmark case of “Mukeshimana-Ngulinzira and Others v. Belgium and Others”:
On April 11, 1994, approximately two thousand men, women, and children were brutally murdered by armed Hutu extremists after a group of Belgian UN peacekeepers abandoned the school facility where they had sought refuge upon the outbreak of the Rwandan genocide. Almost a quarter of a century later, the Brussels Court of Appeal (Court) on June 8, 2018 concluded the civil proceedings lodged by a number of Rwandan survivors and relatives against the Belgian commanding officers and the Belgian state. Overturning an earlier judgment of the Brussels Court of First Instance, the Court held that the decision to retreat from the facility was imputable only to the United Nations, to the exclusion of the Belgian authorities. Accordingly, the claims against the Belgian state were unfounded. The events—which inspired the movie Shooting Dogs (2005)—bear obvious similarities to the role of the United Nations Protection Force’s (UNPROFOR) Dutch battalion (Dutchbat) in the evacuation of the Potoçari camp and the ensuing genocide of seven thousand Bosnian men and boys by Bosnian Serb forces in Srebrenica in 1995. Like the Dutch judgments in the (more well-known) Mothers of Srebrenica proceedings, the Mukeshimana appellate judgment provides a rare national court precedent that considers the imputability of the conduct of peacekeepers to troop-contributing countries. The Mukeshimana judgment, however, raises a high bar for finding such imputability.
Ruys, T. (2020). Mukeshimana-Ngulinzira and Others v. Belgium and Others. American Journal of International Law, 114(2), 268-275. doi:10.1017/ajil.2020.7
The article concludes:
Rather than embrace partial responsibility over the tragic events of April 11, 1994, the Mukeshimana appellate judgment has absolved Belgium from legal liability in respect of the two thousand men, women, and children massacred in the wake of the Groupe Sud‘s retreat. Given the national trauma resulting from the murder of the ten Belgian peacekeepers and Belgium’s role in the context of the Rwandan genocide, as well as the widespread attention for the Mothers of Srebrenica proceedings in the Netherlands, it is quite surprising that the judgment of the Court of Appeal has gone almost unnoticed, not just on the international plane, but even within Belgium itself. Nevertheless, the Mukeshimana judgment creates an important precedent on the imputability of conduct of UN peacekeepers—one that does not bode well for future victims of wrongful conduct by UN peacekeepers.
Ruys, T. (2020). Mukeshimana-Ngulinzira and Others v. Belgium and Others. American Journal of International Law, 114(2), 268-275. doi:10.1017/ajil.2020.7
