ECCHR Discussion: 20 years after Pinochet’s arrest

Berlin’s past and present reveal several links to severe human rights violations, as well as to efforts to address past atrocities. The International Military Tribunal, which went on to prosecute Nazi crimes in Nuremberg, sat in Berlin on 18 October 1945. In Berlin on 17 October 1998, survivors of Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship celebrated after Pinochet was arrested in London. And in the same year, Berlin-based lawyers, politicians and members of the civil society strove for the establishment of the International Criminal Court.

On the occasion of the anniversaries of these diverse historical events, the parliamentary groups of Die Linke und Bündnis 90/Die Grünen  in the Berlin House of Representatives together with the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR) and the Forschungs- und Dokumentationszentrum Chile-Lateinamerika e.V. (Centre for Research and Documentation Chile-Latin America, FDCL) hosted an event.

Survivors, activists and lawyers from Chile and Germany discussed how transnational justice can succeed and what still remains be done.

Panelists included Sebastian Schlüsselburg, spokesperson for legal policy, parliamentary group of Die Linke in the Berlin House of Representatives; Antje Kapek, chairwoman of Bündnis 90/Die Grünen parliamentary group in the Berlin House of Representatives; Naomi Roht-Arriaza, professor of law, University of California, and author of The Pinochet Effect: Transnational Justice in the Age of Human Rights; Winfried Hempel, lawyer and former resident of Colonia Dignidad; Angela Mudukuti, International Criminal Justice Lawyer at the Wayamo Foundation (Berlin), Petra Schlagenhauf, lawyer, and Wolfgang Kaleck, General Secretary of ECCHR.

Please, find the full programm to the event here.