Justice Initiatives
Rerooted listens to the needs of Armenian communities to explore various mechanisms for seeking justice. We follow the lead of our narrators to craft innovative strategies to pursue accountability and recognition across different legal jurisdictions.
Partnerships for Case Building and Litigation Exploration
Rerooted is a partner organization for the Harvard Law School’s Advocates for Human Rights where the students are drafting an Article 15 Communication to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for the crimes that occurred in Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia from May 2021 forward. This is a year-long project, and the students in the end will submit the communication to the Prosecutor’s Office of the ICC. They will additionally advocate to different states parties to encourage them to refer the situation of Armenia to the Court.
Leiden University’s International Humanitarian Law Clinic has take on Rerooted as a client to write a public facing report about the crimes committed during the Blockade and attacks in Nagorno-Karabakh from December 2022 to present, categorizing the harms as forced deportation and persecution. They will contribute to the ICC communication mentioned above, as well as advocate to different states parties to encourage them to refer the situation of Armenia to the International Criminal Court.
Harvard Law School’s Human Rights Entrepreneurs and Incubator Clinic has taken on Rerooted as client for the 2023-2024 Academic Year in which students are supervised by faculty clinicians. The team is exploring litigation avenues in national jurisdictions for the harms committed by Azerbaijan against Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia from 2020 to the present.
Contributions to International Legal Organizations
Rerooted works to bring Armenian voices and perspectives to existing international justice and human rights non-governmental and legal organizations. In the context of Syria, we saw that Armenians were often missing from other organizations’ initiatives, who nevertheless saw the value in capturing testimonies from all of Syria’s minority communities. We have signed memorandums of understanding with the United Nation’s International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism as well as Syria Justice and Accountability Center to add our testimonies to their collections for the aims of case building and accountability.