UN Accountability Mandates in International Justice

Abstract This article discusses an important international justice development, and specifically the rise of a new generation of ‘accountability mandates’ at the United Nations (UN). Often created in response to mass atrocities alleged in country situations falling outside of the International Criminal Court’s jurisdiction, UN accountability mandates are generally tasked to collect, consolidate, preserve, and analyse evidence of international law violations, prepare files, and preserve such evidence until it can be made available to support legal accountability proceedings, including as relevant of the criminal nature. Through such investigative and evidence preservation responsibilities, UN accountability mandates can help fill important impunity gaps by helping to collate information generated by a variety of sources, including civil society documenters, and by laying the groundwork for judicial authorities. Within this broad categorization, however, UN accountability mandates are not a monolith and exist along a spectrum based on the strength of any accountability requirements they contain — including whether they are explicitly mandated to follow criminal justice standards — and their general institutional and operational setup. The investigative mechanisms created for Syria, Myanmar and Daesh/ISIL are specifically tasked to fulfil ‘pre-prosecutorial’ functions and enjoy greater resources and independence than other, less resourced and more ‘hybrid’ mandates — expected to simultaneously fulfil the role of more traditional human rights investigations, while also supporting legal accountability. All, however, play a crucial role within the broader international justice ecosystem, while sharing common challenges that this article submits would be best addressed by permanently centralizing a variety of investigative support functions, to be administered by a dedicated, permanent, standing investigative entity. The article will first provide an overview of how and why UN accountability mandates have evolved over the past decade, and of the important role they have come to play. It will then turn to discussing the case and proposed models for a standing, permanent UN accountability mandate to support future investigations. After providing a comparative analysis of the possible alternatives, the article will conclude with some recommendations and ideas for the way forward.