A/HRC/19/61 D. History and current practice 34. Commissions of inquiry into torture and other forms of ill-treatment may be traced back at least to the practice of ad hoc public inquiries or royal inquiries into a defined issue in the United Kingdom in the eleventh century, and subsequently in other Commonwealth countries. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, public inquiries became prolific in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The inquiries were appointed to advise the Government on a wide range of public policy issues, allegations of wrongdoing by Government officials and investigation into the causes of major disasters. Many other States, including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Kenya, Morocco, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Sweden and the United States of America, have also historically or recently established commissions of inquiry with prescribed membership or given national human rights institutions the mandate to undertake inquires more systematically in order to investigate specific crimes or events. 35. In general, it should be seen as a positive development if States undertake to establish a commission of inquiry in response to alleged violations, since States are accountable to the international community for their solemnly acquired obligations. Some States may, however, establish a commission to give the impression that there is a serious inquiry under way so that the international community is less likely to take action. It is appropriate to presume good faith on the part of the State that establishes a commission of inquiry, but ultimately that good faith should be tested in the results of the exercise. 36. There are also examples of commissions of inquiry that have had limited success owing to other factors. In 2009, the Government of Sri Lanka dissolved the Presidential Commission of Inquiry, established to look into serious violations of human rights committed since 2006. The Commission was unable to complete its mandate as no extensions were granted owing to a lack of resources and political will. 8 The final report of the truth and reconciliation commission in Liberia received criticism that it was poorly drafted, lacked transparent explanation of the evidence on which it was based and contained inconsistent policy recommendations.9 The law that established the truth and reconciliation commission in Indonesia in 2005 was struck down by the Constitutional Court on the grounds that the prerequisite of granting amnesties to perpetrators violated victims’ rights as protected by the Constitution of Indonesia. 10 The truth and reconciliation commission established in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2003 suffered from a number of critical flaws in its structure, including, most prominently, a lack of transparency in the selection of the commissioners, who included individuals with ties to those implicated in the crimes to be investigated.11 1. International commissions of inquiry 37. In recent years, the United Nations has appointed non-judicial commissions of inquiry that have taken a variety of forms. Such commissions were established by the 8 9 10 11 10 See Amnesty International, “Twenty Years of Make-Believe: Sri Lanka’s Commissions of Inquiry”, ASA 37/005/2009. See “Beyond the Truth and Reconciliation Commission: Transitional Justice Options in Liberia”, International Center for Transitional Justice, May 2010. See “Derailed: Transitional Justice in Indonesia Since the Fall of Soeharto”, International Center for Transitional Justice and Commission for the Disappeared and Victims of Violence, March 2011. Available from http://ictj.org/sites/default/files/ICTJ-Kontras-Indonesia-Derailed-Report-2011English_0.pdf. See “Difficult Peace, Limited Justice: Ten Years of Peacemaking in the DRC”, International Center for Transitional Justice, March 2009.