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Memory

How societies organize the remembrance of past crimes

Memory is one of the pillars of transitional justice, which refers to the acknowledgment and consideration of past events, particularly injustices or human rights violations. Justice Info covers how societies organize the remembrance of past crimes, especially following trials or truth commissions.

Portrait of Assumpta Mugiraneza, co-founder and director of the IRIBA Centre for Multimedia Heritage (Kigali, Rwanda).
16 min 23

Assumpta Mugiraneza: “The policy of memory in Rwanda must be reinvented, renegotiated”

Assumpta Mugiraneza, 57, is the co-founder and director of the IRIBA Center for Multimedia Heritage in Kigali. With rare freedom of speech, she recounts the construction of memory after the genocide of the Tutsis in Rwanda in 1994. She talks about Rwandan “memories” and the limited space offered for all of these memories to express […]
By Thierry Cruvellier + Emmanuel Sehene Ruvugiro
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A man looks at the names of genocide victims at the Mount Rebero memorial in Kigali.

At Rebero, political remembrance of the genocide

The plaque next to the

Bonaire: a history of slavery, a present of social inequalities

In memory of the genocide of the Tutsis in Rwanda, 30 years on. Photo: At the end of the commemorations, an elder leaves the Mayunzwe memorial and walks down the hill towards the village.

Mayunzwe remembers the "Calvary" of the Tutsis

Justice in Chile for Pinochet's crimes - Photo: Uruguayan demonstrators celebrate Pinochet's arrest in 1998.

Chile’s ‘Pinochet Cases’ at 25: an ongoing sea change

Herero genocide in Namibia - Propaganda painting showing German soldiers confronting Herero fighters.

A stroll into Germany’s conflicted postcolonial memory

Benjamin Ferencz, young prosecutor at the Nuremberg trial

Benjamin Ferencz: the man who sought peace through law

Inscription on a portal (in Arabic and French):

Adel Maizi: "Remembrance isn’t just about the past, it helps build the future"

A man walks in front of works of art exhibited at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam (Netherlands)

Colonial racism catches up with Amsterdam Rijksmuseum

2 elderly people demonstrate (holding up pictures of Franco's victims), in the streets of Madrid (Spain)

Democratising and decolonising Spain: the limits of the new law on memory

Scene from the play

Tunisia: artists take up the torch of remembrance

Frederick Flick (owner of the Flick company) stands during his sentencing at the Nuremberg trial in Germany.

In Nuremberg, “we started to judge company executives and managers”

Black and white photo of a hospital bed (operating table type) in the 60-70s.

Denmark and Greenland confront a traumatic birth control campaign

Felix Tshisekedi and Denis Sassou Nguesso (foreground) attend the funeral ceremony of Patrice Lumumba (large portrait in background).

Lumumba's tooth is returned, while still waiting for truth

Technical draftsmen work on plans

When business helped a genocide

3 Indonesian veterans (one crying) attend a commemoration ceremony for the victims of the war of independence against the Netherlands

Dutch Colonial Violence and the Missing Voices of Indonesians

Portrait of Lokman Slim

In Lebanon, the Lokman Slim Foundation will keep the memory of political assassinations

Banknote (dated 1920) of one Belgian Franc on which is written

Colonial crimes: Experts recommend that Belgium compensate

Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech in Algiers, surrounded by French and Algerian flags.

France-Algeria: Having the courage to create a Truth and Memory Commission