World Court Treaty Ratified
Despite vehement U.S. opposition, the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal will become a reality on July 1 with support from U.S. allies and nations from every continent.
Ten nations' ratifications brought the total number of countries to ratify the 1998 treaty establishing the International Criminal Court to 66 - six more than needed to bring the treaty into force on July 1.
"The required number of 60 ratifications for the entry into force of the Rome statute has been reached," said Chief U.N. legal counsel Hans Corell. "A page in the history of humankind is being turned."
The 10 nations - Bosnia, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Congo, Ireland, Jordan, Mongolia, Niger, Romania and Slovakia - deposited papers all at the same time so the honor of being the 60th state did not go to one country.
The tribunal is expected to go into operation next year in The Hague, the Netherlands. The new court can try individuals for the world's most serious atrocities: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and other gross human rights abuses.
The court will step in only when countries are unwilling or unable to dispense justice themselves. It will have jurisdiction only over crimes committed after the treaty enters into force.
Philippe Kirsch, chairman of the commission preparing for the court's operation and Canada's ambassador to Sweden, said he expects the court to become operational soon after the states that have ratified the treaty meet in early 2003 to select a prosecutor and judges. Cases can come to the court through a state that has ratified the treaty, the U.N. Security Council, or the court's prosecutor, who must get the approval of a three-judge panel.
Kirsch said he believes that, once the court shows it will act in "a very judicial and nonpolitical way," there will be less opposition.
"In my view, given the United States' tradition of commitment to international justice, it is a matter of time before there is some form of cooperation developing between the United States and an institution of this importance," he said.
The court will fill a gap first recognized by the U.N. General Assembly in 1948 following the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials for World War II's German and Japanese war criminals, respectively. Since then, laws and treaties have outlawed genocide, poison gas and chemical weapons, among other things, but no mechanism has held individuals criminally responsible.
For the Bush administration, however, the court is an unwelcome addition to the international legal establishment. Even though then President Clinton signed the treaty, the United States has refused to ratify it, fearing its citizens would be subject to frivolous or politically motivated prosecutions.
Two weeks ago the Bush administration said it was considering "unsigning" the treaty.