ABSTRACT
The carnage unleashed in Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Sierra Leone in the 1990s shocked the conscience of the world. The brutality witnessed in those countries was broadcast to wide audiences by global media, and revived the post-World War II determination that such horrific events would not go unpunished. The atrocities there rekindled the will to apply and enforce the emerging international norms articulated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenants on Civil and Political, and on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and other seminal treaties and agreements. Whether it was the brutality of ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia, the apocalyptic genocide of Rwanda, or the seemingly psychotic mass amputations of Sierra Leone, these events moved the great powers reluctantly to acknowledge that a forceful and punitive international response to war crimes and crimes against humanity was called for.
