International Criminal Court crumbling, ICC mass exodus

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Burundi Promised More Countries Would Withdraw from the ICC. Now South Africa Has.
24 HOURS AGO CATEGORIES: PASSPORT
Siobhán O'Grady
https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/10/21/burundi-promised-more-countries-w ould-withdraw-from-the-icc-now-south-africa-has/amp/

Last year, when Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir visited Johannesburg for a regional summit, the International Criminal Court expected South Africa’s government to arrest him. After all, Bashir was indicted by the ICC in 2009 on charges he was responsible for genocide and other war crimes in Darfur, and as a member of the ICC treaty, it was up to South African officials to detain him.

But South Africa refused, saying it had promised immunity to all visiting heads of state. The move signaled the continent’s growing distrust of the international court, as leaders in many African nations feel the court unfairly targets Africans. Now, more than a year after the rebuff, South Africa has moved to leave the treaty that founded it.

A document presented to the United Nations on Oct. 19 says that “the Republic of South Africa has found that its obligations with respect to the peaceful resolution of conflicts at times are incompatible with the interpretation given by the International Criminal Court.” It is signed by South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Maite Nkoana Mashabana.

The South African Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but Justice Minister Michael Masutha confirmed to reporters in the capital of Pretoria that the country was pursuing plans to withdraw itself from the court.

“A difficult choice had to be made,” he said.

The decision to withdraw immediately follows Burundi’s decision to do the same. Last week, Burundi, where civil unrest has forced hundreds of thousands to flee as refugees, became the first country in the world to withdraw from the treaty that founded the court in 1998. Its parliament voted overwhelmingly in favor of leaving and Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza has since signed a decree to legalize the withdrawal, though the United Nations has reportedly not yet received confirmation of the departure. It takes one year from the date of receipt for the withdrawal to be official.

At the time, Burundian Ambassador to Washington Ernest Ndabashinze told FP that authorities were “very happy” to be leaving, and promised that other countries would follow.

Many believe that Kenya will be next, in large part because much of the disenchantment among African leaders comes from the ICC’s probe into President Uhuru Kenyatta’s role in post-election violence in 2007. The case has since collapsed, but the incident smeared Kenyatta’s reputation and prompted discussion among African leaders to consider leaving the court.

Burundi has its own reasons for wanting to leave: Earlier this year, ICC prosecutors began investigating the government’s alleged role in extrajudicial killings there.

Photo credit: JUAN VRIJDAG/AFP/Getty Images

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Wow! International News
Putin withdraws Russia from International Criminal Court
https://apnews.com/546f70e94e78497b9d5427b5f95e18a8

MOSCOW (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree Wednesday to withdraw Russia from the International Criminal Court, which rules on such grave charges as genocide and crimes against humanity.

Russia in 2000 signed the Rome treaty that established the Hague-based court but never ratified it.

Putin's decree, published on the Kremlin's website, comes a day after the U.N. General Assembly's human rights committee approved a resolution condemning Russia's "temporary occupation of Crimea" and blamed Russia for rights abuses such as discrimination against some Crimean residents, such as Tatars.

Russia annexed Crimea in March 2014 from Ukraine following a hastily called referendum, a move that led to crippling Western sanctions. A separatist insurgency erupted in eastern Ukraine the following month, backed by Russia.

The ICC on Monday issued a preliminary report where it described what happened in Crimea as "an international armed conflict between Ukraine and the Russian Federation."

His spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, explained the withdrawal by "national interests" and argued that since Russia never ratified it Wednesday's decree was just a formality. Peskov also dismissed the ICC's accusations of an "armed conflict" in Crimea, arguing that Crimea joined Russia after a legitimate popular vote.

Russia's foreign ministry insisted in a statement that Russia wants everyone implicated in grave international crimes to face justice but expressed frustration over the court's work in recent years.

"The court has unfortunately failed to match the hopes one had and did not become a truly independent and respected body of international justice," the ministry said, adding that in the ICCs' 14 years of work "only four verdicts" have been passed while $1 billion was spent on expenses.

Just hours before Russia's announcement, the U.N. human rights chief made a spirited defense of the ICC, entreating countries not to leave it. Several African nations have recently announced plans to leave the treaty.

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Ex-Bosnian Serb leader Karadzic brands Hague’s toughened sentence as ‘futile revenge’
Karadzic

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http://tass.com/world/1049783

World March 21, 14:06 UTC+3
The former leader of the Bosnian Serbs stressed that the Serbian people won, which resulted in the creation of their own republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina
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Radovan Karadzic
Radovan Karadzic© AP Photo/Peter Dejong, Pool
BELGRADE, March 21./TASS/. Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic has labelled The Hague tribunal’s decision as "futile revenge" to increase his sentence to life imprisonment over his participation in the armed conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1992-1995.
"This is futile revenge by The Hague tribunal against me, an old man, who cannot do anything. We did not give up in tougher times and we won’t give up now, I will never stop fighting for the truth about our just cause in the war, which had been imposed on us and where all three nations (Serbs, Croats and Bosnian Muslims) suffered. In any war, especially a civil one, crimes were committed, which our country condemned and investigated if it knew about them. That’s why at anytime and anywhere we will preserve our dignity, we won’t hate others and will proudly keep what is above all of us, Republika Srpska," Karadzic said in his address to the Serbs, which was read out loud by one of his lawyers Marco Sladojevic.
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Radovan Karadzic
Hague court toughens sentence against ex-Bosnian Serb leader Karadzic to life imprisonment
The former Bosnian Serb leader highlighted that against all the odds, the Serbs won a victory, meaning the creation of their own republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina. "The Serbs and I, together we were victorious: Republika Srpska was established and the Serbian people are free in their own country. The sacrifice that I make is smaller than many others - many thousands of young men built Republika Srpska sacrificing their own lives and many of them are disabled veterans. The greatest sacrifice was made by the mothers, whose sons, often the only children in the family, gave their lives for the freedom of the Serbs. This is a genuine sacrifice," Karadzic stressed.
The International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals on Wednesday increased the sentence for Karadzic, 73, from 40 years behind bars to life imprisonment. Karadzic, who had absconded from justice for 13 years, was arrested by Serbia’s intelligence services in the suburbs of Belgrade in July 2008. The trial started in the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) on October 26, 2009. In March 2016, Karadzic was sentenced to 40 years in prison on 10 of 11 criminal counts, including the Srebrenica massacre.
In April 2018, appeal hearings on Karadzic’s case were held in The Hague, during which the prosecutors demanded that the Bosnian Serb leader be sentenced to life imprisonment, while the defense team asked the judges to review the case or acquit the politician.
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