Amnesty: The Price of Peace?

In my last post, I briefly hinted at the idea of fringe or terrorist groups being brought into the political fold.  Now I'd like to talk about a related topic: amnesty for those groups.

Colombia is the latest example of amnesty issues plaguing a war-torn country seeking peace.  Just yesterday, its senate passed -- by a razor-thin 65-3 margin -- a constitutional amendment (dubbed the "Legal Framework for Peace") that gives Colombia's Congress more authority to legislate the conditions under which rebels are prosecuted.  This means, for example, that the Congress could pass legislation directing prosecutors to only go after rebel leaders or making sentences for rebel crimes more lenient.  Former president Uribe has criticized the amendment, deeming any potential amnesty an inappropriate tool with which to handle FARC and other terrorist or rebel groups.

Also interesting: opposition to this law, and many other amnesty laws, comes from human rights organizations.  Human Rights Watch, for example, opposes the amendment because of its potential for amnesty.  A chief source of contention is amnesty for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and similar crimes that are the focus of international criminal law prosecutions.  Indeed, this is a problem in the international law field: international criminal law relies upon the idea that violators of certain egregious crimes are brought to justice, but countries may have to forego some prosecution (or provide lighter sentences) in order to achieve lasting peace.  Some international legal scholars go so far as to claim that countries cannot provide amnesty to those who violate international criminal law.  This, I believe, is a mistake.  While one does not want to diminish the import of crimes committed in the past, it would be a disservice to the people of a country, not to mention the global community at large, if chances for peace were thwarted in favor of an unyielding prosecutorial principle.

This is not to say, of course, that any peace is good peace.  History will always find ways to remind us of the potential for folly -- Chamberlain's peace with Hitler being the most commonplace example.  Still, countries must have the flexibility to develop unique solutions to their unique situations.  Colombia's constitutional amendment is the latest iteration of this concept.  If its execution turns out to be poor, then Colombia will deserve the criticism it will undoubtedly receive.  The law in its current form, however, is more designed to give the Colombian government greater flexibility in dealing with rebel groups -- something with which I believe most reasonable people could agree.