Journal Citation:
21 Berkeley Journal of International Law, 191 (2003).
This article is the foreword to a special edition of the Berkeley Journal of International Law publishing the proceedings of the 2002 Stefan A. Riesenfel Symposium on Crimes Against Women Under International Law. The author prefaces her comments with an account of her own experience in helping a Salvadorian refugee bring a suit against certain branches of the government of El Salvador for sexual crimes committed against her by members of that country's national guard. The author draws attention to ideas advanced at the Symposium that would extend issues of women's human rights into other types of law (international criminal, family, immigration and humanitarian, in particular). She then introduces the articles and speech included in the Symposium edition of the Journal. Topics covered include the prosecution of sexual crimes through the International Criminal Tribunals for the Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda (ICTFY/ICTR), the recognition and prosecution of sexual crimes against women during war as war crimes, forced division of families, rape and genocide, and the historical practice of the use of "comfort women" as the sexual slaves of soldiers and armies. [Descriptors: Armed Conflict, International]