International Criminal Court (ICC)

A few hours ago the ICC issued a warrant for the arrest of Sudan’s president Bashir. This is good news. It was long overdue, as it is overdue for many other presidents starting from Mugabe. One wonders why such a warrant was not issued for GW for Iraq, for Putin for Thectchnia or Livni for Palestine.

This however does not diminish the value of such a step.

And it is interesting to see the first reactions as of now :

- the African Union, that just elected Gaddafi as its leader wondered why the ICC seem (tot hem !) to apply its rules to Africans only. Apart from the fact that they seem to ignore the recent trials for former Yugoslavia, which, to our understanding, is not in Africa, they miss the point: a criminal is a criminal, wherever he is. The AU’s reaction is simply shameful.
- Russia, Ethiopia and Egypt, well known for their democratic policies, have criticized the indictment.
- the USA, that does not recognize the ICC, started defending it (but would never accept US nationals indicted by that court !)

What is going to be most interesting is that the ICC will send a request for assistance to the UN Security Council. And there, three of the five permanent members, the USA, Russia and China, do not recognize the ICC.

Finally, indeed the AU is right in its complaints : the ICC should have also indicted the Chinese authorities who have been supporting Sudan in spite of the genocide in Darfour and who, through their support, for oil interests, just facilitated the mass killings.

Of course the African “leaders” are concerned: they can be the next target. And rightly so. In a recent article in La Repubblica, it was shown that 40% of the life presidents are Africans. And we know how they made it. Let us hope that this indictment will start a cleaning process of African “leaders”: it is time. And we should all keep note of those African, and non African, leaders such as the Russian President Medvedev, who will support Bashir .They should be the next to be indicted.

These are the first remarks immediately after the news of the indictment. I will probably come back on this later in the week.


Photo : sudanwatch.blogspot.com