The question of how criminal justice and punishment should figure in the resolution of the armed conflict in Colombia is a genuinely troubling conundrum. To date the discussion has tended to focus on two aspects. First, the question of whether it is reasonable at all to require justice for the many serious crimes committed in the conflict, given the difficulties this poses for the ongoing negotiations to end the conflict; and second, if so, what are the best mechanisms to pursue justice?
It may be helpful to reframe the question. The International Centre for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) has recently published a paper exploring these ideas in more detail. It suggests that we need to first ask ourselves, what are the policy objectives of punishing the most serious crimes in the context of peace negotiations to end a conflict spanning half a century? Only then should we ask what measures are best designed to secure those objectives.
Instead of asking what right we have to punish, we should be asking what we aim to achieve by punishment.
