Cara Pronk-Jordan: "Kouwenhoven Prosecution: a Dutch Businessman and his Role in Taylor's Crimes"

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Ms Pronk-Jordan received her law degree in 1996 from the Radboud University of Nijmegen (NL) and served as a Magistrate in Training from 1997 to 2003. In 2001-2002 she worked in Bosnia and Herzegovina as a senior human rights lawyer advising the BiH Human Rights Chamber. Between 2003 and 2008 she was a Public Prosecutor with the Office of the Prosecution in The Hague, the Netherlands. During those years, she led a wide range of complex criminal investigations and prosecuted murder cases, serious sex crimes, human trafficking, drug trafficking and discrimination cases. In 2008 she was appointed as Advocate General within the Appeals Division of the Office of the Prosecution in The Hague. In that capacity, she went on to specialise in the investigation and prosecution of war crimes and crimes against humanity before the national Dutch courts. She has dealt with cases concerning crimes committed in relation to the conflicts in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Israel, Rwanda, Argentina and Sri Lanka.

In 2010 she was the lead Prosecutor in the 'Guus Kouwenhoven case' –  which involved a Dutch national and businessman allegedly colluding with the Charles Taylor regime in Liberia. As lead Prosecutor in this case, also heading the investigation team, she successfully closed the Kouwenhoven case with a landmark decision by the Dutch Appellate Courts in 2017, convicting the businessman of violating the UN arms embargoes and complicity to war crimes. He was sentenced to 19 years' imprisonment. As of 2017, she is working closely with the South African Authorities on the extradition of Mr Kouwenhoven to the Netherlands. She is doing so from the Geneva region where she currently resides.