International law experts join torture case
Publish date: 19 May 2014
Issue Number: 577
Diary: IBA Legalbrief Africa
Category: Africa Focus
Several international law experts have described the decision by the South African Police Service not to investigate the torture of opposition activists in the run-up to the 2008 elections in Zimbabwe as 'irrational and unreasonable', says a report in The Sunday Independent.
Professor John Dugard, former UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, University of London criminal law professor Kevin Heller, Stellenbosch University law professor Gerhard Kemp and UCT international law lecturer Dr Hannah Woolaver have joined the case as amici curiae. Police commissioner General Riah Phiyega is appealing against the Supreme Court of Appeal's 2013 judgment declaring that the SAPS is empowered to investigate the alleged offences irrespective of whether or not the alleged perpetrators are present in SA. Police declined to investigate as such action 'would unavoidably violate Zimbabwe's sovereignty'. The matter will be heard today. Full report in The Sunday Independent
