International Criminal Court facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
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 Official logo
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Parties and signatories of the Rome Statute
State party
Signatory that has not ratified State party that subsequently withdrew its membership Signatory that subsequently withdrew its signature Not a state party, not a signatory |
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| Seat | The Hague, Netherlands |
| Working languages | |
| Official languages | |
| Member states | 123 |
| Leaders | |
| Piotr Hofmański | |
| Luz del Carmen Ibáñez Carranza | |
| Antoine Kesia-Mbe Mindua | |
| Establishment | |
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• Rome Statute adopted
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17 July 1998 |
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• Entered into force
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1 July 2002 |
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Website
www.icc-cpi.int |
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The International Criminal Court (ICC or ICCt) is an intergovernmental organization and international tribunal seated in The Hague, Netherlands. It is the first and only permanent international court with jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression. It is distinct from the International Court of Justice, an organ of the United Nations that hears disputes between states.
The ICC is considered by many to be a major step toward justice and an innovation in international law and human rights. However, the ICC has faced a number of criticisms from governments and civil societies, including objections to its jurisdiction, accusations of bias, Eurocentrism and racism, questioning of the fairness of its case selection and trial procedures, and doubts about its effectiveness.
History
Background
The establishment of an international tribunal to judge political leaders accused of international crimes was first proposed during the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 following the First World War by the Commission of Responsibilities. The issue was addressed again at a conference held in Geneva under the auspices of the League of Nations in 1937, which resulted in the conclusion of the first convention stipulating the establishment of a permanent international court to try acts of international terrorism. The convention was signed by 13 states, but none ratified it and the convention never entered into force.
Following the Second World War, the allied powers established two ad hoc tribunals to prosecute Axis leaders accused of war crimes. The International Military Tribunal, which sat in Nuremberg, prosecuted German leaders while the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo prosecuted Japanese leaders. In 1948 the United Nations General Assembly first recognised the need for a permanent international court to deal with atrocities of the kind prosecuted after World War II. At the request of the General Assembly, the International Law Commission (ILC) drafted two statutes by the early 1950s but these were shelved during the Cold War, which made the establishment of an international criminal court politically unrealistic.
Benjamin B. Ferencz, an investigator of Nazi war crimes after World War II and the Chief Prosecutor for the United States Army at the Einsatzgruppen trial, became a vocal advocate of the establishment of international rule of law and of an international criminal court. In his book Defining International Aggression: The Search for World Peace (1975), he advocated for the establishment of such a court. Another leading proponent was Robert Kurt Woetzel, a German-born professor of international law, who co-edited Toward a Feasible International Criminal Court in 1970 and created the Foundation for the Establishment of an International Criminal Court in 1971.
Formal proposal and establishment
The UN Security Council established two ad hoc tribunals in the early 1990s: The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, created in 1993 in response to large-scale atrocities committed by armed forces during the Yugoslav Wars, and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, created in 1994 following the Rwandan genocide. The creation of these tribunals further highlighted to many the need for a permanent international criminal court.
In 1994, the ILC presented its final draft statute for the International Criminal Court to the General Assembly and recommended that a conference be convened to negotiate a treaty that would serve as the Court's statute.
To consider major substantive issues in the draft statute, the General Assembly established the Ad Hoc Committee on the Establishment of an International Criminal Court, which met twice in 1995. After considering the Committee's report, the General Assembly created the Preparatory Committee on the Establishment of the ICC to prepare a consolidated draft text.
From 1996 to 1998, six sessions of the Preparatory Committee were held at the United Nations headquarters in New York City, during which NGOs provided input and attended meetings under the umbrella organisation of the Coalition for the International Criminal Court (CICC). In January 1998, the Bureau and coordinators of the Preparatory Committee convened for an Inter-Sessional meeting in Zutphen in the Netherlands to technically consolidate and restructure the draft articles into a draft.
Finally, the General Assembly convened a conference in Rome in June 1998, with the aim of finalizing the treaty to serve as the Court's statute. On 17 July 1998, the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court was adopted by a vote of 120 to seven, with 21 countries abstaining. The seven countries that voted against the treaty were China, Iraq, Israel, Libya, Qatar, the U.S., and Yemen.
Israel's opposition to the treaty stemmed from the inclusion in the list of war crimes "the action of transferring population into occupied territory".
The UN General Assembly voted on 9 December 1999 and again 12 December 2000 on to endorse the ICC.
Following 60 ratifications, the Rome Statute entered into force on 1 July 2002 and the International Criminal Court was formally established.
The first bench of 18 judges was elected by the Assembly of States Parties in February 2003. They were sworn in at the inaugural session of the Court on 11 March 2003.
The Court issued its first arrest warrants on 8 July 2005, and the first pre-trial hearings were held in 2006.
The Court issued its first judgment in 2012 when it found Congolese rebel leader Thomas Lubanga Dyilo guilty of war crimes related to using child soldiers.
In 2010, the states parties of the Rome Statute held the first Review Conference of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court in Kampala, Uganda. The Review Conference led to the adoption of two resolutions that amended the crimes under the jurisdiction of the Court. Resolution 5 amended Article 8 on war crimes, criminalizing the use of certain kinds of weapons in non-international conflicts whose use was already forbidden in international conflicts. Resolution 6, pursuant to Article 5(2) of the Statute, provided the definition and a procedure for jurisdiction over the crime of aggression.
Organization
The ICC has four principal organs: the Presidency, the Judicial Divisions, the Office of the Prosecutor and the Registry.
- The President is the most senior judge chosen by his or her peers in the Judicial Division, which is composed of eighteen judges and hears cases before the Court.
- The Office of the Prosecutor is headed by the Prosecutor, who investigates crimes and initiates criminal proceedings before the Judicial Division.
- The Registry is headed by the Registrar and is charged with managing all the administrative functions of the ICC, including the headquarters, detention unit, and public defense office.
The ICC employs over 900 personnel from roughly 100 countries and conducts proceedings in English and French.
Operation
The ICC began operations on 1 July 2002, upon the entry into force of the Rome Statute, a multilateral treaty that serves as the court's charter and governing document. States which become party to the Rome Statute become members of the ICC, serving on the Assembly of States Parties, which administers the court. As of March 2022, there are 123 ICC member states; 42 states have neither signed nor become parties to the Rome Statute.
Intended to serve as the "court of last resort", the ICC complements existing national judicial systems and may exercise its jurisdiction only when national courts are unwilling or unable to prosecute criminals. It lacks universal territorial jurisdiction and may only investigate and prosecute crimes committed within member states, crimes committed by nationals of member states, or crimes in situations referred to the Court by the United Nations Security Council.
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The ICC held its first hearing in 2006, concerning war crimes charges against Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, a Congolese warlord accused of recruiting child soldiers; his subsequent conviction in 2012 was the first in the court's history. The Office of the Prosecutor has opened twelve official investigations and is conducting an additional nine preliminary examinations.
Dozens of individuals have been indicted in the ICC, including Ugandan rebel leader Joseph Kony, former President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan, President Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya, Libyan head of state Muammar Gaddafi, President Laurent Gbagbo of Ivory Coast and former Vice President Jean-Pierre Bemba of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
On 17 March 2023, ICC judges issued arrest warrants for Russian leader Vladimir Putin and the Presidential Commissioner for Children's Rights in Russia Maria Lvova-Belova for child abductions in the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Putin was the first head of state of a U.N. Security Council Permanent Member to be the subject of an ICC arrest warrant. (Russia withdrew its signature from the Rome Statute in 2016 and is thus not a participant in the ICC, which therefore has no authority there. However, Putin can be charged for actions against a party and against Ukraine, which is not a party but accepts jurisdiction of the court since 2014. Should Putin travel to a state party, he can be arrested by local authorities.)
Structure
The ICC is governed by the Assembly of States Parties, which is made up of the states that are party to the Rome Statute. The Assembly elects officials of the Court, approves its budget, and adopts amendments to the Rome Statute. The Court itself has four organs: the Presidency, the Judicial Divisions, the Office of the Prosecutor, and the Registry.
State parties
Assembly
The Court's management oversight and legislative body, the Assembly of States Parties, consists of one representative from each state party. Each state party has one vote and "every effort" has to be made to reach decisions by consensus. If consensus cannot be reached, decisions are made by vote. The Assembly is presided over by a president and two vice-presidents, who are elected by the members to three-year terms.
The Assembly meets in full session once a year, alternating between New York and The Hague, and may also hold special sessions where circumstances require. Sessions are open to observer states and non-governmental organizations.
The Assembly elects the judges and prosecutors, decides the Court's budget, adopts important texts (such as the Rules of Procedure and Evidence), and provides management oversight to the other organs of the Court. Article 46 of the Rome Statute allows the Assembly to remove from office a judge or prosecutor who "is found to have committed serious misconduct or a serious breach of his or her duties" or "is unable to exercise the functions required by this Statute".
The states parties cannot interfere with the judicial functions of the Court. Disputes concerning individual cases are settled by the Judicial Divisions.
In 2010, Kampala, Uganda hosted the Assembly's Rome Statute Review Conference.
Organs
The Court has four organs: the Presidency, the Judicial Division, the Office of the Prosecutor, and the Registry.
Presidency
The Presidency is responsible for the proper administration of the Court (apart from the Office of the Prosecutor). It comprises the President and the First and Second Vice-Presidents—three judges of the Court who are elected to the Presidency by their fellow judges for a maximum of two three-year terms.
As of March 2021, the President is Piotr Hofmański from Poland, who took office on 11 March 2021, succeeding Chile Eboe-Osuji. His first term will expire in 2024.
Judicial Division
The Judicial Divisions consist of the 18 judges of the Court, organized into three chambers—the Pre-Trial Chamber, Trial Chamber and Appeals Chamber—which carry out the judicial functions of the Court. Judges are elected to the Court by the Assembly of States Parties. They serve nine-year terms and are not generally eligible for re-election. All judges must be nationals of states parties to the Rome Statute, and no two judges may be nationals of the same state. They must be "persons of high moral character, impartiality and integrity who possess the qualifications required in their respective States for appointment to the highest judicial offices".
The Prosecutor or any person being investigated or prosecuted may request the disqualification of a judge from "any case in which his or her impartiality might reasonably be doubted on any ground". Any request for the disqualification of a judge from a particular case is decided by an absolute majority of the other judges. Judges may be removed from office if "found to have committed serious misconduct or a serious breach of his or her duties" or is unable to exercise his or her functions. The removal of a judge requires both a two-thirds majority of the other judges and a two-thirds majority of the states parties.
Office of the Prosecutor
The Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) is responsible for conducting investigations and prosecutions. It is headed by the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, who is assisted by one or more Deputy Prosecutors. The Rome Statute provides that the Office of the Prosecutor shall act independently; as such, no member of the Office may seek or act on instructions from any external source, such as states, international organisations, non-governmental organisations or individuals.
The Prosecutor may open an investigation under three circumstances:
- when a situation is referred to him or her by a state party;
- when a situation is referred to him or her by the United Nations Security Council, acting to address a threat to international peace and security; or
- when the Pre-Trial Chamber authorises him or her to open an investigation on the basis of information received from other sources, such as individuals or non-governmental organisations.
Any person being investigated or prosecuted may request the disqualification of a prosecutor from any case "in which their impartiality might reasonably be doubted on any ground". Requests for the disqualification of prosecutors are decided by the Appeals Chamber. A prosecutor may be removed from office by an absolute majority of the states parties if he or she "is found to have committed serious misconduct or a serious breach of his or her duties" or is unable to exercise his or her functions. One critic said there are "insufficient checks and balances on the authority of the ICC prosecutor and judges" and "insufficient protection against politicized prosecutions or other abuses". Luis Moreno-Ocampo, chief ICC prosecutor, stressed in 2011 the importance of politics in prosecutions: "You cannot say al-Bashir is in London, arrest him. You need a political agreement." Henry Kissinger says the checks and balances are so weak that the prosecutor "has virtually unlimited discretion in practice".
Lead prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo of Argentina, in office from 2003 to 2012, was succeeded in the role by Fatou Bensouda of Gambia, who served from 16 June 2012 to 16 June 2021 (she was elected to the nine-year term on 12 December 2011).
On 12 February 2021, British barrister Karim Khan was selected in a secret ballot against three other candidates to serve as lead prosecutor as of 16 June 2021. As British barrister, Khan had headed the United Nations' special investigative team when it looked into Islamic State crimes in Iraq. At the ICC, he had been lead defense counsel on cases from Kenya, Sudan and Libya.
Policy Paper
A Policy Paper is a document occasionally published by the Office of the Prosecutor which puts forth the considerations given to the topics the office focuses on, and often the criteria for case selection. While a policy paper does not give the Court jurisdiction over a new category of crimes, it promises what the Office of Prosecutor will consider when selecting cases in the upcoming term of service. OTP's policy papers are subject to revision.
Environmental crimes
The Policy Paper published in September 2016 announced that the ICC will focus on environmental crimes when selecting the cases. According to this document, the Office will give particular consideration to prosecuting Rome Statute crimes that are committed by means of, or that result in, "inter alia, the destruction of the environment, the illegal exploitation of natural resources or the illegal dispossession of land".
This has been interpreted as a major shift in environmental law and a move with significant effects.
Registry
The Registry is responsible for the non-judicial aspects of the administration and servicing of the Court. This includes, among other things, "the administration of legal aid matters, court management, victims and witnesses matters, defence counsel, detention unit, and the traditional services provided by administrations in international organisations, such as finance, translation, building management, procurement and personnel". The Registry is headed by the Registrar, who is elected by the judges to a five-year term. The previous Registrar was Herman von Hebel, who was elected on 8 March 2013. The current Registrar is Peter Lewis, who was elected on 28 March 2018.
Jurisdiction and admissibility
The Rome Statute requires that several criteria exist in a particular case before an individual can be prosecuted by the Court. The Statute contains three jurisdictional requirements and three admissibility requirements. All criteria must be met for a case to proceed. The three jurisdictional requirements are (1) subject-matter jurisdiction (what acts constitute crimes), (2) territorial or personal jurisdiction (where the crimes were committed or who committed them), and (3) temporal jurisdiction (when the crimes were committed).
Process
The process to establish the Court's jurisdiction may be "triggered" by any one of three possible sources: (1) a State party, (2) the Security Council or (3) a Prosecutor. It is then up to the Prosecutor acting ex proprio motu ("of his own motion" so to speak) to initiate an investigation under the requirements of Article 15 of the Rome Statute. The procedure is slightly different when referred by a State Party or the Security Council, in which cases the Prosecutor does not need authorization of the Pre-Trial Chamber to initiate the investigation. Where there is a reasonable basis to proceed, it is mandatory for the Prosecutor to initiate an investigation. The factors listed in Article 53 considered for reasonable basis include whether the case would be admissible, and whether there are substantial reasons to believe that an investigation would not serve the interests of justice (the latter stipulates balancing against the gravity of the crime and the interests of the victims).
Subject-matter jurisdiction requirements
The Court's subject-matter jurisdiction means the crimes for which individuals can be prosecuted. Individuals can only be prosecuted for crimes that are listed in the Statute. The primary crimes are listed in article 5 of the Statute and defined in later articles: genocide (defined in article 6), crimes against humanity (defined in article 7), war crimes (defined in article 8), and crimes of aggression (defined in article 8 bis) (since 2018). In addition, article 70 defines offences against the administration of justice, which is a fifth category of crime for which individuals can be prosecuted.
Genocide
Article 6 defines the crime of genocide as "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group." There are five such acts which constitute crimes of genocide under article 6:
- Killing members of a group
- Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group
- Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction
- Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group
- Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group
The definition of these crimes is identical to those contained within the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948.
