Investigations
PHR's Forensic Investigations
Forensic science is the application of the scientific method within a legal context. In cases of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other abuses such as torture, forensic science can play an instrumental role in documenting these crimes. By documenting, collecting, and providing an expert opinion on the evidence, a record is established ensuring that perpetrators of such abuses are ultimately held accountable.
In order to be able to establish an accurate record of human rights violations, it is necessary to involve forensic pathologists, anthropologists, archaeologists, and other specialists, including such forensic experts as evidence technicians, firearms examiners, forensic chemists, and DNA experts. In this regard, all forensic disciplines today play an important part in investigating human rights violations and breaches of international humanitarian law.
Physicians for Human Rights believes that forensic investigations provide a powerful tool for uncovering and documenting human rights violations while giving a voice to the victims and their families. Forensic investigations address the need for justice, provide evidence for court proceedings, and place evidence and findings in a historic record that is resistant to revisionism.
By holding individuals responsible for violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, individual responsibility is assigned for what is often seen as collective guilt. This provides the most secure foundation for the future respect of human rights and humanitarian law.
Physicians for Human Rights’ International Forensic Program has completed forensic projects in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cyprus, Guatemala, Iraq, Poland, and several other countries. Our forensic experts have testified at the International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and Yugoslavia, and at the Special Court for Sierra Leone. In El Salvador, PHR has helped reunite families separated during the 1980–1992 civil war by providing resources and forensic expertise in support of the work of Asociación Pro-Búsqueda de Niñas y Niños Desaparecidos, a Salvadoran nonprofit.
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