1 The Establishment of the ICTY and the ICTR

As is well known, in 1945 and 1946 after the Second World War, the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg (the Nuremberg Tribunal) and the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (the Tokyo Tribunal) were established by the Allied Powers to prosecute German and Japanese war criminals.¹ In 1993 and 1994 for the first time since the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials, the international community created two further international criminal tribunals to try individuals charged with violations of international humanitarian law. The first is the ICTY which was established by UN Security Council Resolution 827 of May 1993² ‘to prosecute persons responsible for serious violations of international 8humanitarian law committed in the territory of the former Yugoslavia since 1991’.³ The second is the ICTR which was set up again by the Security Council Resolution 955 of 8 November 1994⁴ ‘to prosecute persons responsible for serious violations of international humanitarian law committed in the territory of Rwanda and Rwandan citizens responsible for such violations committed in the territory of neighbouring States, between 1 January 1994 and 31 December 1994’.⁵