International Criminal Court

The training on Logical Framework Analysis (LFA) was organized with simultaneous translation in English and French for 9 key staffmembers of the Outreach Unit of whom some are managing a country office and others are based in The Hague.

A description of the mandate of the Outreach Unit with the International Criminal Court can be read at their web site: http://www.icc-cpi.int/outreach.html

The training highlighted the need to establish very good relations with public and private local organizations and agencies to disseminate their messages and to listen the 'voices' of the affected communities. It is often very difficult to establish such two way communications in areas still under stress.

The practical exercises in the training highlighted the difficulties and the need for local participation in developing effective tools and appropriate messages to establish this special kind of communication particularly because such messages need to change during the judicial phases or stages of the proceedings.

Trial workshops to develop a country specific strategy were organized in Central African Republic and in The Hague with affiliated NGOs. Workshops in Congo and Sudan may follow.

Strategic plan for ICC outreach programme in CAR

18 – 20 February 2008 a LFW workshop was facilitated in Bangui to develop a strategic plan for the ICC outreach programme in the Central African Republic. The subject was how to organise the communication between ICC and the population about the role of ICC and about the expectations and preoccupations of the population with regard to the troubles that occurred in 2002 and 2003 in and around Bangui. Representatives of stakeholder organisations, such as churches, media, lawyers and NGO’s representing the victims, participated voluntary and with outstanding energy in the development of the plan. Evaluating the workshop the 17 participants found that the workshop and results obtained were completely (4) or for the largest part (13) satisfying. The plan will be utilised by ICC to develop its outreach programme and the participants of the workshop will remain as a reference group for ICC for regularly monitoring and evaluation of the plan.