scholarly journals Unpacking the African Backlash to the International Criminal Court (ICC): The Case of Uganda and Kenya

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-67
Author(s):  
Joe Oloka Onyango
Keyword(s):  
International Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Double Standards ◽  
Selective Approach ◽  
Systemic Factors ◽  
Law And Justice ◽  
The Way

From early bright beginnings and close cooperation, African relations with the International Criminal Court (ICC or Court) have recently witnessed a sharp deterioration. The explanations for this fall-out vary from the personal style of the first Prosecutor of the Court—Luis Moreno Ocampo—to the lack of a comprehensive appreciation of the reasons for which the institution was established in the first instance. This article specifically zeroes in on the troubled interactions between the Court and the governments of Uganda and Kenya. These two instances demonstrate that while the charge of anti-African bias has become the dominant discourse of contemporary scholarship on the issue, structural and systemic factors are not given enough attention. Particular attention is given to the way the cases of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) and President Uhuru Kenyatta (from Uganda and Kenya respectively) found their way to the ICC and the subsequent developments relating thereto. In doing so, the article explores, among other factors, the way International Criminal Justice was politicised, and its links to enduring questions of global political and economic inequality. Such conditions of inequality find manifestation in the backlash by African countries towards what has been described as the ICC’s selective approach. At the same time, opportunism and double-standards abound on all sides as there is both an inconsistent and hypocritical embrace of the basic tenets of International Criminal Law and Justice. Ultimately, the victims of human rights violations are short-changed while those actors who really need to be brought to account remain beyond sanction.

Africa and the Legitimacy of the icc in Question

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 615-624 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mandiaye Niang
Keyword(s):  
International Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
International Justice ◽  
African Union ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Current Challenge ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
The Way

This article focuses on the current challenge facing the International Criminal Court (icc), as its legitimacy is questioned by an increasing number of African countries. This challenge is all the more sensitive, when the African Union forum appears to act as an official platform giving credence to, and indeed amplifying, the echo of these opposing voices. Do those African countries or African leaders have a point when they complain about selective prosecutions targeting only Africans? If so, are there any effective remedies that could alleviate their concerns, while not compromising the need for justice? What is the way forward for the icc if this institution is to build a future in and with Africa? This article does not provide definitive answers to these questions. It attempts to shed light upon avenues that might be worthwhile exploring, to build consensus and to marshal some much-needed support for international justice.

Is the ICC Focusing Too Much on Non-State Actors?

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frédéric Mégret
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
Real Issue ◽  
State Actors ◽  
Law And Justice

One of the most significant contributions of Bill Schabas to the study of international criminal law is his critique of the tendency of contemporary international criminal justice to focus on individuals associated with non-state actors as opposed to states. This chapter seeks to first evaluate it as an empirical claim to assess the degree to which the International Criminal Court (ICC) has, if at all, disproportionately focused on non-state actors, beyond the well-known case of state self-referrals. It then addresses the normative case against such an evolution. The real issue is jurisdictional and a matter of prosecutorial policy rather than the substantive one of whether non-state groups can commit international crimes. The conclusion envisages what it is that is common between states and certain armed groups that ought to give a particular character of gravity to their acts and recommend them for special attention from international criminal law and justice.

The Lasting Legacy of Double Standards: The International Criminal Court and the UN Security Council Referral Mechanism

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 251-284
Author(s):  
Gabriel M. Lentner
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal Court ◽  
Structural Changes ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
Double Standards ◽  
Un Security Council

Common narratives in international criminal law give the impression that the arc of international criminal law is long but bends towards justice. In this article, I wish to challenge this and show that we actually see more of the same. I adopt a consequentialist approach for analysing these issues: what are the real outcomes of the structural changes that happened via the involvement of the UN Security Council (unsc) and are they driven more by power or principle? Through case studies of the two existing referrals of the situations of Darfur and Libya I challenge the progress narrative often implied in international criminal law discourse. I show that through the institutional structure and limitations in practice, the unsc referral mechanism operates as a continuation of double standards by other means and that power influences accountability much more than principle even without direct unsc intervention.

scholarly journals Reflections on the Indictment of Sitting Heads of State and Government and Its Consequences for Peace and Stability and Reconciliation in Africa

2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-59 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles Chernor Jalloh
Keyword(s):  
International Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
Practical Reasons ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Global Consensus ◽  
Rules Of Procedure ◽  
Chief Prosecutor ◽  
Heads Of State ◽  
Current Concerns

Abstract In these remarks, the author considers the most recent challenge to the application of international criminal justice in Africa: Kenya’s controversial November 2013 proposal to amend the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court to temporarily exempt from prosecution sitting presidents accused of involvement with international crimes. He examines several legal and practical reasons why such a proposal is untenable. Instead, citing the principle of complementarity and urging the principled use of judicial and prosecutorial discretion, he contends that much of the African Union’s current concerns about the Kenya Situation can be addressed within the confines of existing Rome Law. This is important because, even if it is possible for African countries to secure amendments to the Rules of Procedure and Evidence, African States Parties are unlikely able to secure the global consensus required to effect substantive amendments to the 1998 treaty. On the other hand, the author suggests that the International Criminal Court officials, especially the judges and the chief prosecutor, can help bridge the apparent gap between the Court and its African supporters. Towards that end, they should consider taking a more flexible and more nuanced approach to their interpretations and application of several important provisions contained in their founding statute. Eschewing a one-size fits all approach, it is submitted that each African situation is unique – both in the scope of the problem, and in the solution required in the necessary fight against impunity in Africa.

scholarly journals The International Committee of the Red Cross and the International Criminal Court: Turning international humanitarian law into a two-headed snake?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Fernanda García Pinto
Keyword(s):  
International Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Committee ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
Red Cross ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Gender Based Violence ◽  
Critical Approach

Abstract The International Committee of the Red Cross and the International Criminal Court are two very different entities that simultaneously apply international humanitarian law but do so after their own perspectives. This article proposes a cautious yet critical approach to some of their divergent interpretations (conflict classification, the difference between direct and active participation in hostilities, intra-party sexual and gender-based violence, and the notion of attack) and examines how the broader legal system copes with these points of divergence. The analysis considers the institutional characteristics of these two organizations and the pluralistic nature of international humanitarian law as well as its dynamic rapport with international criminal law in order to highlight the versatility needed to face the challenges posed by contemporary armed conflicts.

The Contestation of Value-Based Norms: Confirmation or Erosion of International Law?

2019 ◽  
pp. 311-334
Author(s):  
Tiyanjana Maluwa
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
The Right ◽  
First Time ◽  
Normative Powers

The chapter discusses the concepts of shared values and value-based norms. It examines two areas of international law that provide illustrative examples of contestation of value-based norms: the fight against impunity under international criminal law and the debates about the responsibility to protect. It argues that the African Union’s (AU) difference of view with the International Criminal Court (ICC) over the indictment of Omar Al-Bashir is not a rejection of the non-impunity norm, but of the context and sequencing of its application. As regards the right of intervention codified in the Constitutive Act of the AU, Africans states responded to the failure of the Security Council to invoke its existing normative powers in the Rwanda situation by establishing a treaty-based norm of intervention, the first time that a regional international instrument had ever done so. Thus, in both cases one cannot speak of a decline of international law.

scholarly journals The Legacy of the ICTY and ICTR in China

AJIL Unbound ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 110 ◽  
pp. 245-250
Author(s):  
Bing Bing Jia
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal Court ◽  
Rome Statute ◽  
Ad Hoc ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Criminal Tribunal ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
International Tribunal

Legacy is a matter that may become topical when its creator finally stops producing. Normally, the silent years would be many before the thought of legacy enters into open, formal discourse among lawyers and decision-makers. This comment treats the meaning of the word as relative to the circumstances in which it is invoked. The more closely it is used in relation to the present, the more distant it drifts from its literal meaning, to the extent that it denotes what the word “impact” signifies. This essay questions whether the word “legacy” is apt in describing the footprint of the work of the two ad hoctribunals in China, where its influence has, as a matter of fact, been waning ever since the adoption of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court in 1998 (“Rome Statute” ). The Chinese example suggests that the work of the tribunals is (at least so far) no more significant to international criminal law than the illustrious Nuremberg and Tokyo Trials of the 1940s. The most major impact (a more apposite term than legacy) of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) for China may be that China’s policy with regard to the tribunals, manifested mostly in the United Nations, has determined its approach to the International Criminal Court (“ICC” ). For that, the work of the tribunals could be considered as having left China something in the nature of an indirect legacy.

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