Peace Versus Accountability?

In an article from The Guardian, African Search for Peace Throws Court into Crisis , author Chris McGreal analyzes the struggle between achieving both peace in Uganda and accountability for the horrific actions committed by Joseph Kony, the leader of the Lord's Resistance Army. The Lord's Resistance Army has abducted children from their homes and forced them to become child soldiers, along with murdering and raping countless people, wreaking havoc throughout Uganda. While the ICC has investigated the crimes committed by Kony at the request of the Ugandan government, Kony has declared that the charges must be dropped in order for a peace deal to be reached. Uganda's president, Yoweri Museveni, has asked the ICC to agree to Kony's demands to bring peace to the region. Meanwhile, the ICC's credibility will be severely damaged if their first case is not seen through to fruition, thereby weakening the idea of international justice.

This dynamic forces us to question whether abandoning the idea of justice is worthwhile if it means bringing peace to a region that has been devastated by civil war, whose children have never truly experienced a childhood, whose families have been destroyed, whose lives have been ruined. However, will this peace be a lasting peace especially if the leaders of the LRA obtain immunity? And what precedent does this set for the international community? One question that is at the heart of this debate is what the effect of the ICC will be, can it actually be an arbiter of justice that will cause these horrible leaders to think twice before acting, or will it never be enough of a deterrent?

I do not have answers to any of these questions. Currently, it seems to be, that I must think of those suffering in Uganda, and I personally would put the prospect of peace above the need to indite Kony. However, this decision comes from a gut reaction that lives must be saved and that choosing peace over justice has the potential to save the most lives at the moment. This decision may not have the same effects in the long-run; if the ICC can be strengthened by this conviction and it can help prevent future instances of mass violence, then perhaps I would have made the wrong decision. I do not think there is a right answer to this dilemma and it is one that will continue to dampen the prospect of both a system of international accountability and of a lasting peace in a war-torn region.