Umbrellas in the Court

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I came to Sarajevo to work at the State Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, specifically for the management section, the Registry, which supports the War Crimes and Organized Crimes sections of the Court. In a few years, the Court will be composed entirely of Bosnian nationals, but for now there are plenty of internationals like me floating around, essentially helping the Bosnian government rear this baby Court -- it is only a year old -- into a fully functional arm of the law. In the meantime, many of the war crimes cases from the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (the ICTY, which is in the Hague) are gradually being transferred here. The idea is to establish the rule of law in Bosnia and, namely, allow the victims of the war to mete out their own justice.

Strangely enough, a war crimes court is a goofy work environment. Everyone takes their jobs extremely seriously, of course -- how can you not? -- but when you deal with horrific atrocities and a highly dysfunctional governmental structure every day, laughter preserves sanity. Often the humour pertains to these very horrors in a sick but necessary way which outsiders might find offensive. I have often found that those involved in human rights have the most twisted senses of humour.

In addition, the various departments of the Court operate with strict confidentiality for legal purposes -- for example, Prosecution naturally cannot divulge details about cases to Judicial Support, the section which helps judges. So, at lunchtime no one discusses work. Instead, wisecracking is the order of the day, especially constant ribbing. To survive, you must learn the fine art of responding to rapid-fire mockery from finely-tuned legal minds.

Pictured at left is my boss, Inma, a tiny exuberant lady from the Basque region of Spain. She is a feared, uncomprising pitbull with co-workers, but also a charmer who sends me encouraging emails like "Rock & Roll!!!!" - her favourite expression. At right is my officemate, hombre, and general partner in crime, Owusu from Ghana. On only my third day of work, we were told by our administrator, Javier, that we had to move offices. He warned us that our new workspace had a leaky ceiling and issued umbrellas. As it turned out, it was just the loveable, cursing, smoking Spaniard up to no good again.