oa ‘De zware last van het koloniale verleden wordt door rechters niet meer gedragen’

Lawyer Liesbeth Zegveld is specialised in human rights violations and committed to supporting war victims. Since some years, she represents victims of the Indonesian independence war (1945-1950) in the Dutch court. These lawsuits increased pressure on the Dutch state to admit to its war crimes during this war. For Tijdschrift van Genderstudies, Zegveld was interviewed about how she became involved in the lawsuit of the widows of the village of Rawagede and about the various other lawsuits demanding compensation from the Dutch state that followed from there. She provides insight into the role of the Comité Nederlandse Ereschulden in bringing these cases to court. Zegveld addresses how ‘race’ and gender do not only intersect in human rights violations itself, but also in the possibility for victims to be heard in court and become claimants. She explains how the Dutch state is slowly being made accountable for its colonial past, almost seventy years after the atrocities of the Indonesian independence war.