Week Four: Independence Day, Prague, and Ugandan Warlords
I’ve been in Geneva for just over a month now!
At work this week, I continued working on the proposal for the campaign that will accompany the Global Partnership Council. We needed to make sure the campaign had a measurable goal given that the goal is to impact 1 million people through IBJ’s work. Essentially I had to review IBJ's numbers throughout the past 25 years of work and determine which metrics we can use for the campaign to hit 1 million.
I also continued research for the legal project on the ICC and complimentary. We have started reviewing ICC case law. It was a surprise that the ICC only has 32 completed cases to sort through. As you can imagine, sorting through ICC cases about crimes against humanity wasn’t the most inspiring activity. We’ve been looking into reasons that the ICC has determined that countries are unwilling and unable to prosecute crimes that have occurred in their countries. For example, the ICC took over the prosecution of Joseph Kony, a Ugandan warlord, and his allies. In peace negotiations, he agreed that he and his officers would submit to trial in Uganda. He did not in fact submit to prosecution at the conclusion of the conflict (right now he is rumored to be in hiding in Darfur). The ICC, recognizing that there would be no trial held in Uganda, took on the case.
Outside of work this week:
- On Monday, I moved into the Foyer, a student housing building much closer to the office than my Airbnb. It’s also where John and Kristen live, so we were all excited to be in the same place. We celebrated by watching last week’s Presidential debate on Kristen’s balcony.
- The Americans in the office led the charge to hold a 4th of July Party, which we had in one of our Swiss friends’ backyards. We barbecued brats and burgers and forced our European friends to listen to the most American music we could think of (God Bless the USA, etc.).
- I headed to Prague for the weekend to visit Olivia! My favorite thing about the weekend was the food, which I was not expecting to blow me away. After a month of Geneva prices, full meals in Prague were simply incredible. I will be thinking about the Apricot dumplings, fried egg rolls, kolaches, and pistachio cake I had in Prague for some time!
- We explored Prague Castle, saw what is known as one of the most beautiful libraries in the world, and visited several bookstores.
