Corte Penal Internacional

The first appearance of former Philippine President Rodrigo Roa Duterte before the International Criminal Court took place without theatrics, on Friday 14 March 2025. Photo: © ICC-CPI

Internacional,

For each of his high-level arrest warrants, the International Criminal Court (ICC) chief prosecutor Karim Khan has seen his announcements met with a flurry of responses. These responses have grown increasingly cynical about the reality of these officials ever sitting in any of the ICC’s courtrooms in the Hague. Coupled with the prosecutor’s office (OTP) ongoing attempt to have an ‘in absentia’ confirmation of charges hearing for 20-year-ICC-fugitive Joseph Kony, I expressed my own cynical exasperation to a colleague last month, that the letters ‘I.C.C.’ would soon stand for ‘I Confirm Charges’.

As 2024 drew to a close, the Court’s 2025 calendar perspectives remained anaemic – with just two judgements pending, one trial ongoing, and “no prospect” of new trials.…  Seguir leyendo »

Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte takes an oath as he attends a senate probe on his drug war in the Philippines on 28 October 2024. Duterte was arrested on March 11, 2025 after landing at Manila’s international airport on an International Criminal Court warrant. He was taken into custody in The Hague the following day. Photo: © Jam Sta Rosa / AFP

MundoAsia,

The International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation into Rodrigo Duterte’s “drug war” has been ongoing since 2017. Duterte served as president from 2016 to 2022 and although he withdrew the Philippines from the ICC in 2019, he remained liable for crimes committed up to 2019. Depending on how far back the court wants to go, Duterte was also mayor of Davao city in the southern Philippines from 1988. He has openly admitted to killing people himself and with his Davao Death Squad, whose extrajudicial executions are well documented.

The Hague court has called for witnesses -- somewhat naively, given the danger it may put people in.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalOrden Mundial

Robert Badinter (1928-2024) nous a quittés il y a un an. Pour lui, la justice pénale internationale, à l’essor de laquelle il a consacré toute son énergie, était une exigence. Selon ses propres termes, « la longue marche du droit international contre l’impunité des grands criminels tend vers un ordre juridique mondial de nature à satisfaire l’universalité des droits de l’homme ». Comment pourrait-on interrompre cette marche ? Que dirait-il s’il était encore présent à nos côtés alors que le droit international humanitaire est piétiné ? Ce n’est pas travestir sa pensée que d’oser dire qu’il serait désespéré, mais aussi déterminé car il ne baissait jamais les bras.…  Seguir leyendo »

Displaced Palestinians taking shelter on a beach in Khan Younis, Gaza, November 28, 2024. Jehad Alshrafi/Anadolu/Getty Images.

MundoOriente Próximo,

On November 21, when three International Criminal Court judges issued arrest warrants for leaders of Israel and Hamas, the decision drew a frenzy of hostile and often ill-informed reactions from many American lawmakers and defenders of Israel. The incoming senate majority leader, John Thune, had already called the charges against Prime Minister Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant “outrageous and unlawful” and promised that imposing sanctions against the ICC would be a “top priority in the next Congress”. Now Senator Lindsey Graham threatened to “sanction any country that aids and abets the arrest of any politician in Israel”, including Britain, Canada, France, and Germany.…  Seguir leyendo »

In the judgment against Abdoulaziz Al Hassan, the judges of the International Criminal Court - from left to right, Tomoko Akane (Japan), Antoine Kesia-Mbe Mindua (Democratic Republic of Congo) and Kimberly Prost (Canada) - agreed on almost nothing. Photo: © ICC-CPI

Internacional

On Wednesday 26 June 2024, a panel of three ICC judges – Antoine Kesia-Mbe Mindua (Democratic Republic of the Congo), Tomoko Akane (Japan), and Kimberly Prost (Canada) – handed down their verdict in the case of Al Hassan Ag Abdoul Aziz Ag Mohamed Ag Mahmoud. The case against ‘Mr. Al Hassan’ was protracted, complicated, and controversial. His alleged crimes were committed in 2012 and 2013. He surrendered to the court in 2018. Charges were first confirmed against him in 2019, before being amended in 2020. The trial itself lasted 3 years: 2020–2023. With a judgement originally scheduled for January 2024, an illness affecting Presiding Judge Mindua caused an unforeseen and unspecified delay.…  Seguir leyendo »

The international criminal court in The Hague. Photograph: Peter Dejong/AP

MundoOriente Próximo,

I should not be surprised at the lawlessness of a government that bombs and starves Palestinian civilians in Gaza, but I was still shocked by the brazenness of Israel’s efforts to subvert the international criminal court’s investigation of its war crimes. As exposed by the Guardian along with the Israeli media outlets +972 and Local Call, the Israeli government over the course of nine years “deployed its intelligence agencies to surveil, hack, pressure, smear and allegedly threaten senior ICC staff in an effort to derail the court’s inquiries”.

The effort was brazen. Mysterious men visited the former chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, outside her private home and handed her an envelope of cash, which the ICC believed “was likely [Israel] signalling to the prosecutor that it knew where she lived”, the Guardian has reported.…  Seguir leyendo »

The ICC Palestinian challenge

MundoOriente Próximo,

Amid a new wave of Israeli-Palestinian violence that has already left  nearly 100 people dead since the beginning of the year, the International Criminal Court is still working on Palestine with regard to events since 2014. This task is complicated by the international community’s current preoccupations with the Ukraine issue.

In 2009, the Israeli army carried out a military offensive, Operation Cast Lead, in the Gaza Strip, claiming it was responding to rocket fire from Hamas, which controls that part of the Palestinian territory. Nearly 1,500 Palestinians (82% civilians) were killed, as well as three Israeli civilians and nine Israeli soldiers.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalONU

Let’s face it, the International Criminal Court, which celebrates its twentieth anniversary on July 1, is suffering from a lack of results.  In two decades, and at a cost of almost two billion dollars, the ICC has never sustained the atrocity conviction of any state official at any level anywhere in the world. Some of its leading cases have collapsed because of faulty case-building, reversals on appeal, and outright sabotage by targeted officials. The only defendants convicted of atrocity crimes in 20 years have been five African rebels.

And yet, the ICC has had an important impact on global justice, through its governing Rome statute which has been transposed into many national laws, and the  baseline international presumption in favor of accountability it helps promote, as well as through the pressure it has exerted on some states like Colombia to undertake prosecutions or risk an ICC investigation.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalOrden Mundial

“Los crímenes más graves de trascendencia para la comunidad internacional no deben quedar sin castigo”. Y “los Estados adoptarán las medidas necesarias e intensificarán la cooperación internacional para que los autores de esos crímenes no queden impunes”.

Estas esperanzadoras palabras del Estatuto del Tribunal Penal Internacional (TPI) chocan, en ocasiones, con la realidad. La invasión de Ucrania por Rusia y los crímenes cometidos por las autoridades de este país, lo demuestran.

El TPI nació como un tribunal penal permanente para toda la comunidad internacional y con altas expectativas, para investigar y enjuiciar a las personas físicas, autoras de crímenes de genocidio, de lesa humanidad, de guerra y de agresión, cuando los Estados o no quieren hacerlo o carecen de capacidad.…  Seguir leyendo »

El presidente de Colombia, Iván Duque, con el Fiscal de la Corte Penal Internacional (CPI) Karim Asad Ahmad Khan luego de la firma del Acuerdo de Cooperación en Bogotá el 28 de octubre de 2021. (Presidencia de Colombia vía Reuters) (Colombian Presidency/Via Reuters)

MundoAmérica, ,

El pasado 28 de octubre, el gobierno del presidente de Colombia, Iván Duque, y el fiscal de la Corte Penal Internacional (CPI), Karim Khan, suscribieron un Acuerdo de cooperación que cierra una investigación preliminar contra este país, abierta desde 2004, por supuestos crímenes de guerra y de lesa humanidad.

Esta inesperada y polémica decisión podría interpretarse como un nuevo capítulo de impunidad en Colombia. Sin embargo, el acuerdo suscrito entre Khan y Duque abre una puerta que parecía cerrada a un proceso de paz que languidece, ya que indica la necesidad del respaldo irrestricto a la Jurisdicción Especial para la Paz (JEP), el tribunal especial creado para juzgar a los actores del conflicto armado en Colombia.…  Seguir leyendo »

Nazi leader Hermann Goering sits in the witness box at the Nuremberg War Crime Trials, where he was later sentenced to death, in 1946.

ReflexionesSocial,

Time is a funny thing. Not so long ago, it seems, I was an Indian girl, coming of age under the South African apartheid regime. Now I am 80 and apartheid is history, but challenges remain. The country is not yet an equal society -- economically or politically.

To see how far we have still left to go to achieve true equality -- not only in South Africa but anywhere in the world where people are denied human rights and justice -- can feel daunting, but we must remember that if we do not remain vigilant, demand accountability and continue to work toward ending human rights violations everywhere, they are likely to be repeated anywhere.…  Seguir leyendo »

Internacional,

El tres de septiembre de 2020 seis jóvenes portugueses de nueve a veintiún años demandaron ante el Tribunal Europeo de Derechos Humanos a la mayoría de los Estados miembros del Consejo de Europa. Apoyados por el Global Legal Action Network (“Haciendo frente a la injusticia a través de estrategias jurídicas internacionales” es su lema), alegaron como justificación de la demanda y de acuerdo a los artículos 2 y 8 de la Convención Europea de Derechos Humanos el profundo y dañino impacto que el cambio climático está teniendo tanto en su vida personal como en la familiar.

Afortunadamente, a causa del galopante cambio climático y los serios daños que determinadas multinacionales están provocando, la preocupación de la sociedad ha crecido enormemente en años recientes.…  Seguir leyendo »

Sudan's ousted president Omar al-Bashir (centre) during his trial along with others over the 1989 military coup that brought them to power, at a courthouse in Khartoum. Photo by Mahmoud Hjaj/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images.

MundoÁfrica, ,

The demand for justice was a major driver of the December 2018 Sudanese revolution that saw former President Omar al-Bashir removed after almost three decades in power, and ensuring accountability is now one of the biggest challenges facing the transitional government which replaced him.

Atrocities committed under the Bashir regime are already well documented, such as the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and the displacement of millions in Darfur, the Nuba Mountains, and Blue Nile.

The Darfur situation was referred to the International Criminal Court (ICC) by the UN Security Council back in 2005, and arrest warrants were issued against Bashir and four others.…  Seguir leyendo »

Internacional

After struggling for months to reach a consensus on who should be the next chief prosecutor, International Criminal Court members on Friday resorted to a vote by secret ballot. After two rounds of voting, British lawyer Karim Khan was declared the winner. He will replace Fatou Bensouda, whose nine-year term ends June 15.

Khan has served in multiple international courts, including the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, established after the Balkans conflict and the Rwandan genocide. More recently, Khan led a United Nations criminal probe into suspected war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide by the Islamic State militant group in Iraq.…  Seguir leyendo »

Internacional, ,

Existen cuatro crímenes execrables que conmocionan las conciencias de la mayoría de los seres humanos: genocidio, crímenes de guerra, depuración étnica y crímenes de lesa humanidad. Se han cometido desde el inicio de los tiempos. Tras la Primera Guerra Mundial hubo reacciones ante los horrores vividos. Vividos de nuevo durante la segunda, la Carta de Naciones Unidas recogió en 1945 estas preocupaciones. En los años ochenta y noventa del pasado siglo diversos gobiernos apoyaron el llamado derecho de injerencia (ascendido por algunos a deber) en los Estados que cometieran los crímenes en cuestión. No obstante, no fue hasta 2005, año en que la Asamblea General de la ONU convocó una cumbre sobre el tema, que todos los miembros de la Organización aprobaron por unanimidad la doctrina de la Responsabilidad de Proteger (RdP), diseñada para poner coto a los crímenes atroces.…  Seguir leyendo »

La fiscala Fatou Bensouda en 2018. Credit Peter Dejong/Pool vía Reuters

MundoAmérica, ,

El informe presentado ante las Naciones Unidas por la Misión Internacional Independiente sobre Venezuela (FFM, por su sigla en inglés) le ha dado a la fiscala de la Corte Penal Internacional (CPI), Fatou Bensouda, una oportunidad de oro para saldar su deuda con Venezuela y, al mismo tiempo, dejar un legado duradero.

El informe emitido recientemente por la FFM, creada por el Consejo de Derechos Humanos de las Naciones Unidas, corrobora lo que organismos internacionales como la Organización de los Estados Americanos (OEA) y la oficina de la alta comisionada de las Naciones Unidas para los Derechos Humanos vienen advirtiendo, con un tono cada vez más perentorio, sobre los crímenes ocurridos en el país.…  Seguir leyendo »

A protester carries a former Belarusian flag during an opposition rally by the Minsk Hero City Obelisk. Photo by Valery Sharifulin\TASS via Getty Images.

Europa,
Making the case

The recent election results in Belarus have triggered revolution in yet another post-Soviet country and Aliaksandr Lukashenka’s response has been devastatingly brutal. However, the Belarusian people’s resilience and Western sanctions – adopted on 14 August – have proved effective. As some of the 6,700 jailed protesters were released, accounts of horrific treatment by law enforcement emerged: overcrowded cells, no food, torture, forced confessions, severe beatings , and threats of rape.

With reports of mounting violence, Polish MEP Radosław Sikorski warned Lukashenka to expect not just sanctions but also the possible intervention of the International Criminal Court (ICC), an idea supported by the opposition-led Belarus’ National Salvation.…  Seguir leyendo »

Internacional

In the United States and the wider world, seismic discussions are raging about the need to see justice done when fundamental human rights are violated. This is no time for any government to exert coercion against an international court that was created to do justice when there is nowhere else to turn for it.

But last week, in the latest of an escalating series of attacks against the International Criminal Court, President Trump’s administration announced new acts of economic pressure against the court. Why? Simply for doing its work by seeking to investigate allegations of war crimes committed in Afghanistan. Allies of America, human rights organizations and bar associations — notably the European Union, France, Germany and the American Bar Association — have expressed deep concern.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAméricaMundoOriente Próximo, , ,

President Trump declared a national emergency last Thursday — but it wasn’t about the covid-19 pandemic or police brutality or nationwide protests. Rather, the subject of the emergency declaration was the International Criminal Court, the body investigating the United States for suspected war crimes in Afghanistan.

Trump announced that the ICC represents an “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.” The executive order pushes back by authorizing economic and diplomatic sanctions on ICC personnel working on the Afghanistan probe and anyone who helps them.

The Trump administration has consistently and directly opposed the ICC, in contrast to the more passive opposition or even ad hoc support from previous administrations.…  Seguir leyendo »

A painting by the artist Banksy, in 2015 in Gaza. Divorce between Israel and the International Criminal Court was consumed in Rome in 1998, when Tel Aviv refused to sign and ratify the Statute, following its recognition of the transfer of the civilian population as a war crime. © Mohammed Abed / AFP

MundoOriente Próximo, , , ,

To me, the subject of Israel and Palestine, the relations between the two entities and their peoples, as well as the role of third actors (international or not), including the International Criminal Court (ICC), has been of concern for many years. The so-called Palestine Situation before the ICC seems to put into perspective the meetings and dialogues I had more than twenty years ago. Professionally, I have devoted my energy for the past fifteen years to international criminal justice, both in teaching and research and in practice, where I have been able to work alongside the Prosecutor General of Israel, the defence and more recently, in the representation of victims of international crimes.…  Seguir leyendo »