Since the Nuremberg trials after World War II, the involvement and complicity of
companies in gross human rights violations has been acknowledged. Today, corporations
can and do play an important role in the commission of international crimes,
by tolerating or supplying the means for the commission of these crimes and supporting
the perpetrators of these crimes. Criminal investigations as well as tort lawsuits
have been initiated in various countries. However, no corporation has ever
been convicted for complicity to international crimes or other gross human rights
violations.
Most prevalent in accusations of corporate involvement in gross human rights
violations are companies that belong to the extractive industries. Following scholarly
debates on the “resource curse” thesis and the “grievance-not-greed” thesis on
the convergence of natural resource richness, armed conflict, and gross human rights
violation in certain countries, the involvement of the extractive industries should not
come as a surprise. Also, the Panel of Experts on the Illegal Exploitation of Natural
Resources and Other Forms of Wealth of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC),
established by the UN Security Council, found that 157 corporations were directly
or indirectly involved in illegal exploitation, thus enabling the purchase of arms and
the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity. As such, the DRC case
framed the role of corporations in the trade of conflict commodities.