Criminal Law – Page 3

Belgium Initiates ICJ Proceedings against Senegal

Filed Under: Digest

On Thursday, Belgium initiated proceedings at the International Court of Justice against Senegal over the state’s refusal to prosecute Hissène Habré, the former president of Chad. Habré was the leader of Chad from 1982-1990 and his government was notorious for massacring various ethnic groups and ordering the torture and murder of political opponents. He was deposed in 1990 and went into exile in Senegal.

Belgium alleges that since that time Senegal has denied a number of requests to prosecute Habré. A complaint was filed in Senegal in 2000, which led to Habré being placed under house arrest after being indicted for “crimes against humanity, acts of torture, and barbarity.” However, he has not been criminally prosecuted; Senegalese officials claim that it is a lack of funds that has prevented a trial from moving forward. A similar complaint was raised against Habré in Belgian courts in 2001. Belgium issued an international arrest warrant in 2005, but Senegal has taken no action on that warrant.

After repeated attempts at negotiation and arbitration over the last several years, Belgium brought its case to the ICJ, citing a violation of the UN Convention against Torture. Belgium requested that the Court require Senegal to bring criminal proceedings against Habré, or to extradite him to Belgium. Additionally, Belgian officials asked the ICJ to take provisional measures to ensure that Habré remains under police supervision. Senegalese President Wade has made public comments stating that if the money could not be found for Habré’s trial, he would be released from house arrest.

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ICTY Amends Karadzic Indictment

Filed Under: Digest

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) partially granted the prosecution’s motion to amend the indictment against Radovan Karadžic on February 16.

The amended indictment charges Karadžic, former President of the self-proclaimed Republika Srpska, with two counts of genocide for atrocities committed in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the 1992-1995 war. He is expected to enter a plea to the new charges on February 20.

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Scholar Argues For Tougher Reponse to Piracy

Filed Under: Digest

In the wake of steadily increasing aggression on the part of pirates operating in the Gulf of Aden, law enforcement mechanisms for preventing piracy are falling short. Eugene Kontorovich, a scholar of international law at Northwestern Law School claims that new tools are needed to combat piracy in the waterways off Somalia that carry about one-third of the world’s seaborne trade.

The international community has recently tried to fill this security deficit. A new U.N. Security Council resolution, strongly backed by the United States, authorizes military attacks on suspected pirates in the area in and around the Aden Gulf. The authorization includes attacks on land bases, even when those bases are in Somali territory. Additionally, the U.K. and Kenya have agreed that the British Royal Navy will submit all pirates it captures during operations around Somalia to trial in domestic courts in Mombasa.

Kontorovich claims that these measures are responses to a larger inability of international criminal law to address the problem of piracy. As international law favors trials over direct engagement, Kontorovich argues that the international community will, and should, turn away from judicial remedies to control piracy. He believes that granting pirates the full spectrum of rights due criminal defendants unfairly ties the hands of the world community. Yet, he also argues that the credibility of international criminal law is at stake. Kontrovich believes that that if international criminal law fails to effectively combat piracy, it will not bode well for its ability to prevent or punish graver war crimes.

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Ukranian Arms Ship released by Somalian Pirates

Filed Under: Digest

On February 11, 2008, the Ukrainian arms freighter ‘Faina’ returned to the Kenyan Port of Mombasa with twenty sailors. The ship had been captured by Somali Pirates in the Gulf of Aden region more than four months ago, and was released after a ransom of $3.2 Million was para-dropped onto the ship by its owner. The capture of the ship was of particular concern to the international community because it was carrying arms including T-72 tanks, grenade launchers, antiaircraft guns, and substantial ammunition. For more information on this story click here.

Pirates have attacked more than 130 merchant ships in the Gulf of Aden region in 2008. In an unrelated event five suspected Somali pirates have been extradited to Netherlands for the failed attempt to hijack the Dutch Cargo Freighter ‘Samanyulo’ on 2^nd January 2009. They will be prosecuted before the Dutch criminal courts and could face up to nine years of imprisonment if found to be guilty with the group leaders punishment extending up to 12 years. For more information on this story click here.

In another piracy-related event in the Gulf of Aden, the US Navy arrested seven suspected pirates on February 11, 2009, who were attempting to hijack the tanker ‘Polaris’. The seven suspects were taken aboard the USS Vella Gulf, which has been patrolling the area since January 2009 in responnse to the heightened piracy threat in the region. The US Navy intends to hand over the suspects to Kenya, which is setting up a new court system to try foreign pirates. For more information please click here.

ICC's First Trial Commences

Filed Under: Digest

The trial of Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, a former Congolese militia leader, commenced on January 26, 2009 at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. He is charged with War crimes of enlisting, conscripting, and using child soldiers under the age of 15 in the conflict in the Ituri region of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in 2002 and 2003.

The beginning of the trial marks a notable step forward for the tribunal, which was created to try large-scale human rights violations. The trial of Mr. Lubanga has taken almost three years to commence since he was first taken to The Hague. Judges halted proceedings last July, citing both legal and strategic errors by the prosecution and stating Mr. Lubanga should be set free because the “prosecution’s handling of evidence amounted to ‘wholesale and serious abuse’ of the process and ruled that fair trial was not possible at that point.” (NYT). The errors have been addressed and the case is now being tried by three judges who are from Britain, Costa Rica, and Bolivia.

This trial will be using a new technique in international law by allowing victims to play a direct role in the trial and be represented by their own lawyers. 93 victims are expected to participate in the Lubanga case.

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Detainee Poses Early Challenge for Obama

Filed Under: Digest

If Harvard Law School Dean Elena Kagan’s nomination as Solicitor General is successful, one of her first tasks will be the February 20th brief in an enemy combatant case, Al-Marri v. Pucciarelli, addressing the Bush Administration’s assertion that the President may order the military to seize legal residents of the United States and hold them indefinitely without charging them with a crime.

Ali Al-Marri is a Qatari student and legal U.S. resident who was arrested in Illinois in December 2001 for fraud. Upon receipt of information identifying him as a sleeper agent for Al Qaeda, those charges were dropped and he was transferred to military detention. The government is holding him without charges at the Navy brig in Charleston, S.C. Intelligence officials argue that Al-Marri is particularly dangerous, which makes deportation problematic, and charges may not be filed due to the potential involvement of torture in evidence gathering.

While Al-Marri’s continued detention is arguably legal as a result of post-September 11 congressional legislation, given the President-elect’s public statements against such detentions, the Obama Administration may find it a politically difficult position to maintain.

More information is available here and here.