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War Don Don (2010)
Directed by Rebecca Richman Cohen
www.wardondonfilm.com
83 minutes
Fambul Tok (2011)
Directed by Sara Terry
www.fambultok.com
82 minutes
The West African coastal country of Sierra Leone endured devastating civil warfare from 1991-2002. In the aftermath, the Sierra Leonean government invited the United Nations to establish an international war crimes tribunal to try those "most responsible" for the rape, amputation, and other atrocities forced upon the civilian population after 1996, when a new coalition government fueled the pillage of lives and resources instead of mitigating it. Neighboring Liberian head of state Charles Taylor and thirteen other commanders representing three indistinct combatant groups - civilian defense forces (CDF), state-sponsored soldiers (AFRC), and Revolutionary United Front rebels (RUF) - were indicted and tried by the Special Court for Sierra Leone. In addition, the Sierra Leonean courts, engaging both formal and customary law, tried other selected commandoes for war-related crimes. A Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was also established, sponsored by both the United Nations and Sierra Leone. From 2002 - 2004 the TRC assembled evidence and testimony for an "impartial" historical record, intended to be the basis for historical and personal understandings, not by the country's courts or the Special Court. Despite these efforts, a great many offenses in this war remained inadequately addressed. Victims and combatants returned (or not) to destroyed communities, personal trauma, and ravaged economies.
Two recent documentaries focus on distinct Sierra Leonean reconciliation processes performed by the judiciary and by arbitration. Neither Sierra Leone's judiciary nor the arbitration practices popular in the countryside are enough to redress Sierra Leone's massive war wounds. Both have been augmented for application in the war's aftermath.
Rebecca Richman Cohen's War Don Don, ("the war is over" in Krio, Sierra Leone's lingua franca) explores the Special Court's treatment of RUF commander Issa Sesay, one of the indicted who lived to stand trial. While a student at Harvard Law, Cohen interned with the defense in the AFRC-accused case (2004-2007) and returned to film the RUF-accused segment of the trial that began in 2004 and ended in 2009. Acclaimed as insightful critique of international justice, War Don Don highlights charges against the Special Court itself levied by Sesay's competent defense. The defense claims that Sesay...