ICC takes another step forward

国際刑事裁判所が発足

The ICC was established in 1998 by a treaty that has since been signed by 89 countries. Officially, the tribunal opened in July 2002 when 60 countries ratified the convention, but it has not had the key personnel required to conduct business. The 11 men and seven women who have joined the bench will hear cases involving genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. Anyone, from a head of state to an ordinary citizen, is potentially subject to its jurisdiction. More than 200 complaints have already been lodged with the court.

The court is not unprecedented. There have been ad hoc war crimes trials in the past, from the Nuremberg and Tokyo tribunals after World War II to existing courts that are trying cases arising from the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s and the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. Unlike the latter two tribunals, the new court will not be a U.N. body, which means, in principle, that it will be sheltered from the political considerations that all too often influence that institution's actions.

Although opening ceremonies were historic, the court is not yet ready to do business. A prosecutor has yet to be appointed. That individual will investigate complaints and decide whether to bring a case before the tribunal with the approval of three judges. The position was expected to be filled by April, but thus far the selection process has been slow. The current chief U.N. prosecutor for the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal in The Hague, Ms. Carla Del Ponte, has expressed interest in the job, and the Swiss government has said it is ready to back her candidacy if it gets support from a majority of the other ICC members.

Among the countries that will not be conferring on that selection is the U.S. Washington's refusal to participate in the ICC is one of the court's biggest shortcomings. The U.S. originally backed the creation of the court, but fearing politically motivated prosecutions, the Bush administration withdrew its signature from the treaty establishing the tribunal.

Worse, the U.S. has pressured other countries to sign bilateral agreements that would exempt U.S. citizens from the ICC's authority by reportedly threatening, among other things, to cut off military assistance to governments that do not grant U.S. citizens immunity from the court's jurisdiction. Some two dozen countries have agreed to those deals.

U.S. opposition makes sense only in the supercharged atmosphere of Washington. The framers of the court's enabling statutes bent over backward to accommodate U.S. concerns. For example, the ICC will have jurisdiction only when a country cannot, or will not, prosecute war-crime suspects on its own. A legitimate national investigation of a war-crime accusation would shelter a country from ICC scrutiny. By those standards, the U.S. should have nothing to fear — except the partisan attacks from within the U.S. against multilateralism in general and the notion of a supranational order and rule of law.

A government that wishes to be totally unrestrained might be expected to chafe against such restraints, but they represent little more than an attempt to put teeth into norms that have guided the international system since the end of World War II. The list of grievances against the Iraqi president, for example, would make an excellent indictment. An international tribunal with genuine authority would have made U.S. President George W. Bush's case without triggering the backlash against U.S. unilateralism that is now sweeping the globe.

As it stands, refusal to acknowledge the authority of the ICC puts the U.S. in the same camp as Iraq, Zimbabwe, Libya, North Korea and Cuba — along with China and Russia, two other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council. It is undistinguished company.

The Japan Times:
March 24, 2003
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      しかし、国連安保理の5常任理事国のうち、ICC設立に反対する3ヵ国（米国、中国、ロシア）は式典に参加しなかった。イラク戦争は、ICC反対が近視眼的であることを示している。

      ICCは98年に設立され、設立条約はこれまでに89ヵ国により批准されている。大量虐殺、人道に対する罪、戦争犯罪の容疑者を裁くICCには既に200件を超える訴えが寄せられている。

      戦争犯罪を裁いた例としては第2次世界大戦直後のニュルンベルク裁判、東京裁判や、バルカン紛争、ルワンダ大虐殺関連の国連決議による裁判があるが、ICCは国連には無関係で政治的影響を受けない。

      4月にはICCの検察官が選任される予定で、国連旧ユーゴスラビア戦争犯罪国際法廷のデルポンテ主任検察官が候補にのぼっており、スイス政府は、ICCを認めている他国の過半数が賛成すれば彼女を推すつもりだ。

      米国は当初、ICC設立を支持していたが、ブッシュ政権は政治的動機による訴追をおそれ設立条約の署名を撤回した。米国はさらに、各国政府に対し米国人をICCに引き渡さない2国間協定を要請している。

      米国の立場に配慮し、ICCは戦争犯罪容疑者を関係国が裁かない場合に限り裁判権を持つことになった。戦争犯罪について正当な国内裁判手続きが行われるのであれば、ICCの裁判は必要なくなる。

      真の権威を持つ国際法廷で、米国がフセイン・イラク大統領の犯罪について訴えれば、イラク戦争のように米国の単独行動主義が非難されることはないだろう。

      ICCを認めない米国は、イラク、ジンバブエ、リビア、北朝鮮、キューバ、中国、ロシアなどと同様のあまり立派とは言えない立場に立たされている。

The Japan Times Weekly
March 29, 2003
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