Changing of the Guard: Bensouda In, Ocampo Out

Posted on June 15, 2012 by Mark Kersten

Former Nuremberg Tribunal Prosecutor, Ben Ferencz and new ICC Prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda (Photo: CICC/Solal Gaillard)

Fatou Bensouda has officially replaced Luis Moreno-Ocampo (who is off to FIFA!) as the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. With dozens of writers and observers scrambling to publish their thoughts on what Bensouda’s tenure will and should focus on, I figured I would add a collection of thoughts as well.

African Savior of African-ICC Relations?

There is no point in denying that Bensouda became Prosecutor in large part because she is African. Very early in the process of selecting a new Prosecutor, the African Union (AU) insisted that an African had to be selected. The AU subsequently met little to no resistance and endorsed Bensouda for the job last year. With that said, Bensouda was, in many ways, the perfect candidate. Her resume is sterling, allowing her – and her supporters – to rightfully argue that her record made her an ideal Prosecutor. She thus satisfied both the merit-based and political criteria for the position. Moreover, the sense of continuity she brings to the position after being Moreno-Ocampo’s Deputy Prosecutor may turn out to be a subtle but crucial aspect of her selection.

Yet, it would be wrong to suggest that just because Bensouda is African she will immediately restore relations with those African states who have increasingly criticized the Court for its perceived bias in Africa. As I have argued elsewhere, I believe that the animosity of some African states toward the ICC is a result of the Court’s increasingly close relationship with key powers on the UN Security Council, a relationship that has reaffirmed rather than transcended the global power asymmetries that African states have long sought to undermine and make more equal. It is not surprising that the most vociferous critiques of the Court have come in the wake of UN Security Council referrals of Sudan and Libya to the ICC (as well as the ICC’s investigations in Kenya, which the Prosecutor opened on his own volition). After all, who wouldn’t be disappointed and angered with a Court that appears more interested in catering to the interests of a powerful non-member state, the US, than the thirty-plus member states from Africa without whom the Court would quickly slip into irrelevance?

Of course, this doesn’t mean that the fact that Bensouda is African won’t have important implications. It will, especially in how the Court is perceived. Bensouda’s heritage will undoubtedly make it more awkward and difficult for members of the AU to say the Court is against Africa. After all, she is their selection!

Moreover, we are likely to see a diplomatic dance between the African Union and Bensouda for the next little while as African states get a feel for her and the direction she intends to take the Court. Rather remarkably, Bensouda was invited to the African Union summit in July, already indicating a level of engagement that was impossible in the last years of Moreno-Ocampo’s tenure.

In short, there is an opportunity to improve relations between the Court and African states, but Bensouda shouldn’t be seen as a silver bullet in this context. Whether the relationship is truly transformed will depend on what Bensouda does – and not who she is or where she is from. As the chairman of the Nigerian national human rights commission, Chidi Odinkalu, exclaimed:

“Will she wave a magic wand and cure all the difficulties that exist at the ICC at the moment? No. Can she bring positive disposition over time to transforming the polluted atmosphere in which the institution has been operating in Africa? Absolutely.”

Stand up to the Security Council

One thing that Bensouda could do that I believe has the potential to transform relations between the ICC and African states, as well as boost the legitimacy of the Court, is to be tougher on the Security Council. The Council has instrumentalized the Court, nowhere so clearly as in the case of Libya. It remains a distinct possibility that the intervention in Libya will leave the ICC with a large bill, no one in the dock, and a debilitating controversy over ICC staff members.

Will the ICC, under Bensouda’s leadership, stand up to key powers on the UN Security Council?

Of course, standing up to the Security Council is no easy task. After all, the Court clearly gets a sense of legitimacy from gaining jurisdiction into non-member states. As I have written before, the Court is stuck between a rock and hard place in terms of its relationship to the Council. But being more vocal about its disappointment in the Council’s lack of political and material support for the Court’s mandate would be a healthy start. Some, including the former President of the ICC’s Assembly of States Parties, have even suggested that if the Council were to refer another situation to the Court such as Syria, the ICC might do well to simply say: “no thank you.”

On this matter, I have my doubts that the Office of the Prosecutor is ready to take a strong stance. Bensouda recently said that she views the ICC as a “tool” of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) which, of course, can only be invoked by the UN Security Council.

Sexual and Gender Crimes

It has been widely suggested that investigating and prosecuting gender and sex-related crimes will be a major focus of Bensouda’s tenure. This would be a welcome development. Gender and sex crimes have largely escaped attention at the ICC. Earlier this year, she discussed her views on the matter: Continue reading →

Posted in African Union (AU), Fatou Bensouda, Human Rights, ICC Prosecutor, International Criminal Court (ICC) | 1 Comment

ICC Staff Locked up in Libya: An Unfolding Debacle

Posted on June 12, 2012 by Mark Kersten
Zintan brigade

A member of the Zintan Martyr Brigade in September, 2011 (Photo: Eric Feferberg/AFP/Getty Images)

It isn’t getting any better for anyone involved. Many will already be aware of the arrest of four ICC staff by a militia in Zintan, Libya, on allegations of spying. The controversy it spawned revolves around Melinda Taylor, an Australian defense lawyer at the ICC who, it is alleged, passed on “dangerous” documents and was found with spying devices when she met with Saif al-Islam Gaddafi last week in a visit approved by Libyan authorities. Her interpreter, Lebanese-born Helene Assaf, is being considered an “accomplice”. Two other ICC staff members, a Spaniard and a Russian, are voluntarily staying with Taylor and Assaf, an act of remarkable solidarity and integrity.

Yesterday, the team was transferred from a guest-house in Zintan to a Libyan prison, on the behest of the Libyan Prosecutor General, for a forty-five day detention period. It is not clear which prison they are being held at, although AFP journalist Maude Brulard told me earlier that, according to members of the militia, the prison is under control of Libya’s defense ministry.

After arriving on Sunday, officials from the ICC were finally granted a visit by Libyan authorities to the four staff members in Zintan today. However, they found themselves unable to reach Zintan after being held up at a checkpoint. According to Marie-Louise Gumuchian,

In scenes that summed up the chaos and instability in Libya since a revolt last year ousted and killed Gaddafi, when the ICC delegation arrived at a checkpoint outside Zintan, militiamen told them no one was being allowed in because of clashes with a rival tribe nearby.

The 7-vehicle convoy parked up near the checkpoint but over an hour after arriving they were still waiting to go into Zintan, even though the visit had been approved by authorities in the capital, Tripoli…

…The clashes were happening about 50 km (30 miles) south of Zintan, well away from the route being used by the ICC delegation.

“I believe there is a problem, fighting. We weren’t told, we were just given orders not to allow any cars in,” said one man, dressed in military fatigues and carrying a Kalashnikov rifle at the checkpoint.

At the same time, a particularly controversial statement was made by NTC spokesperson, Mohammed al-Hareizi, in an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). Al-Hareizi suggested that Taylor was being held, not for any particular violation, but because the government believed that they could bargain her freedom for knowledge of Mohammed Ismail’s whereabouts. Ismail is considered a close friend, confidante and, some say, “henchman“, of Saif. It has been alleged that Taylor gave “coded” letters from Ismail to Saif during their meeting. Al-Hareizi is quoted as saying:

“We want this guy. It is very important to catch this guy because this guy is very, very, very danger(ous) for us…

…We don’t have anything against this woman. Just we need some information from her, after that she will be free.”

This is particularly damning evidence against any possible case that Libya has in detaining and investigating Taylor and Assaf. If al-Hareizi’s words reflect the attitude of the NTC, then it is clear that Taylor and Assaf’s arrest have nothing to do with the law or justice and everything to do with leveraging the freedom of ICC staff for political gain. Incredibly, this was admitted while Libya is attempting to convince ICC judges that it is able and willing to try Saif domestically. As I argued earlier this week, that seems an increasingly remote possibility. Of course, holding and investigating the two ICC staff members is problematic regardless of the NTC’s or the Zintani militia’s intentions behind doing so.

Melinda Taylor ICC

Melinda Taylor, who was detained with three other ICC staff members while visiting Saif al-Islam Gaddafi last week.

Like others, I am flabbergasted with how quickly some have suggested that the ICC team is guilty and that, if they broke the law, they should be investigated in Libya. This is hugely problematic. First of all, while the allegations are certainly serious, no real evidence has been presented that any laws were actually broken. We simply do not know the truth about what transpired.  Continue reading →

Posted in Defense Counsel, International Criminal Court (ICC), Libya, Libya and the ICC | Tagged , , , | 7 Comments

The End of Amnesty: Whither “Peace Versus Justice” in Northern Uganda?

Posted on June 12, 2012 by Mark Kersten
Former LRA rebel

A former member of the LRA who escaped a year and four months after being abducted in 2008 (Photo: Marcus Bleasdale)

I couldn’t resist contributing to the discussion that Mark Schenkel has begun with his fantastic post on the expiration of northern Uganda’s Amnesty Act. Readers shouldn’t let the fact that the story hasn’t been widely covered fool them into believing it isn’t of tremendous importance or that its implications aren’t significant. As Mark has shown, it is and they are.

I wanted to highlight just how remarkable it is that not only has the expiration of Part 2 of the Amnesty Act come as a surprise to many observers, but it has subsequently been met with barely a murmur – almost as if it wasn’t all that important. This is noteworthy in its own right. When the ICC intervened in northern Uganda in 2004 and subsequently issued arrest warrants for LRA leader Joseph Kony and four other senior rebel commanders, the “peace versus justice” floodgates opened. The debate was pervasive and polarizing. Much of it revolved around the over-simplified but potent question of whether rebels should be forgiven via amnesty or punished via the ICC. A legion of local and international voices declared that peace could only be achieved if LRA rebels could be guaranteed that they would not be prosecuted if they left the bush. This view was premised on fears that the threat of prosecuting rebels would leave them with no option but to continue fighting. They consequently called on the ICC to back off and give peace through forgiveness a chance. Of course, the ICC warrants stayed in place. However, thousands of LRA combatants received amnesty certificates following their defection from the rebel ranks.

Just years later, the “peace versus justice” debate has virtually disappeared. Take, for example, the prosecution of Thomas Kwoyelo, the former senior LRA commander who was detained by the Ugandan forces (UPDF) in 2009. True, the controversy around Kwoyelo’s prosecution  has concerned whether he should be issued an amnesty. But the debate has almost exclusively been a legal debate, centering around whether or not he is eligible to receive an amnesty under Ugandan law (answer: absolutely) and whether receiving an amnesty is in contravention of Uganda’s international obligations (answer: I don’t think so). What the debate hasn’t been about is whether granting Kwoyelo amnesty would risk undermining the progress northern Uganda has made towards order and stability.

Charles Banya, a former LRA rebel (Photo: Marcus Perkins)

Consider too the example of Caesar Achellam, the LRA rebel commander who was recently “captured” by Ugandan military forces. Again, there exists no palpable concern that arresting Achellam and possibly putting him on trial jeopardizes peace in northern Uganda. Interestingly, the Achellam story has received significantly more international coverage than the Kwoyelo trial. But it received attention primarily because of Invisible Children’s ‘KONY2012’ campaign. As I noted previously, virtually every story about Achellam’s “capture” cited KONY2012 and the now world-famous “hunt for Joseph Kony”.

Moreover, in my experience interviewing individuals involved in the northern Ugandan peace process, including government ministers, religious and civil society leaders, as well as delegates from the peace talks, there remains almost little to no concern that the ICC or any form of trial justice risks undermining peace. In short, it really does appear that northern Uganda has moved beyond the “peace versus justice” debate. Continue reading →

Posted in Amnesty, Peace Processes, Transitional Justice, Uganda | Tagged | Leave a comment

The Path Towards Prosecution: An End to Amnesty in Northern Uganda

Posted on June 11, 2012 by Mark Kersten

Mark Schenkel joins us for this insightful and thought-provoking guest-post on the expiry of Uganda’s Amnesty Act and its implications for transitional justice in northern Uganda. Mark is a Dutch journalist based in Kampala, Uganda. He covers developments in East Africa for various media in The Netherlands and Belgium. Enjoy!

Amnesty Commission

A pamphlet from the Ugandan Amnesty Commission encouraging rebels to defect from the LRA and return home in exchange for amnesty (Photo: Resolve)

The recent expiry of Uganda’s long-running amnesty provision for armed rebels has taken quite a number of observers by surprise. On May 23rd, the centerpiece of Uganda’s twelve year old Amnesty Act, whichprovides blanket amnesty to anyone who denounces armed rebellion, lapsed despite media reports and statements by politicians suggesting that the entire Act was going to be renewed. The expiry of the essential part of the Act clearly has far-reaching implications for the debate about whether to forgive or prosecute members of the notorious Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA).  

Uganda has taken a new and major step on the path away from amnesty and towards prosecution of LRA rebels. But first let us look at how the confusion and surprisement surrounding the Amnesty Act’s partial ending came about.  

The expiry of Part 2 of the Act – the one dealing with the actual amnesty – was reported on Monday May 28th in the government-owned newspaper New Vision. It was a brief piece, on page 3. As it turned out, minister of Internal Affairs Hilary Onek had used his mandate to renew only the three other parts of the Act, dealing mainly with resettlement and re-integration of former rebels. The various elements of the Act, which was put in place in 2000 during the height of the LRA insurgency to encourage rebels to lay down their weapons, can be renewed every six months.  

The independent newspaper, Daily Monitor, apparently wasn’t aware of the developments yet. On Tuesday the 29th, it still carried a story about whether or not Ceaser Acellam is eligible for amnesty. Acellam, a high-ranking LRA-commander, had fallen into the hands of the Ugandan army in mid-May (some sources say Acellam surrendered and wasn’t ‘captured’, as the army insists). The Monitor didn’t refer to the lapse of Part 2 of the Amnesty Act the week before, whereas the lapse’s logical consequence is that Acellam is in no way eligible for amnesty (it has, to my knowledge, nowhere been officially declared that Acellam had applied for amnesty before the lapse of Part 2). Only on Sunday, June 3rd did the Monitor report about it. In the meantime, Uganda Radio Network had caught up on the news, just like several foreign media (Radio Netherlands Worldwide and the UN-subsidized IRIN).  

Truth be told, initially I myself thought that the Amnesty Act would be renewed in its entirity. Journalists, legal observers, members of Uganda’s general public – most people were under the same impression. One possible explanation is that back on April 16th, Deputy Speaker of Parliament Jacob Oulanyah was quoted as saying that the Amnesty Act was going to be renewed. Oulanyah spoke in the Northern Ugandan town of Gulu, in front of thousands of people who had showed up for the public screening of KONY2012.  

Another explanation for the widespread expectation that the Act was going to be renewed may lay in the government’s decision to let part of the Act lapse without parliamentary approval – technically, this approval is not required. The decision wasn’t debated among the Ugandan people’s representatives. In its own statement on the website of the Ugandan media centre – posted several days after the expiry of the Act’s part 2 – the government didn’t explicitly say that amnesty is no longer in existence.

Recently “captured” senior LRA commander, Caesar Achellam (Photo: AFP)

Lastly, an explanation may be that during the days before part 2 expired, the Directorate of Public Prosecution (DPP), the Amnesty Commission as well as lawyers were publicly debating Ceaser Acellam’s eligibility for amnesty. When I contacted them after the expiry had come to light, both the DPP and the Amnesty Commission said that at the time of their public comments, no decision on the (partial) renewal of the Amnesty Act had yet been made. They simply discussed Acellam’s situation under the then-applicable rules – meaning an Amnesty Act still intact. Continue reading →

Posted in Amnesty, Kwoyelo Trial, Transitional Justice, Uganda | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Tinker, Tailor, Lawyer: ICC Staff Arrested in Libya for “Spying”

Posted on June 10, 2012 by Mark Kersten
Saif Gaddafi Zintan

Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, not long after his arrest by Zintani rebels in November, 2011

I really hope John le Carré has read news of the arrest of four ICC staff members in Zintan while attempting to visit Saif al-Islam Gaddafi. A delegation, which includes an Australian lawyer, Melinda Taylor (media reports have not named any other members of the delegation), were detained while attempting to provide Saif with information and documents pertaining to his defense against charges of war crimes for his role in the Libya’s revolution. The team had been invited by the Libyan General Prosecutor’s office to visit Saif. When the delegation went to visit Saif, however, everything went pear-shaped.

A commander from the Zintan brigade, Ajmi al-Atiri, described what appeared to be an intelligence operation against the ICC staff:

“We tricked the ICC team by presenting them with one of our men who we told them was deaf and old and illiterate but he is actually a wise man who can speak four languages including English.

That is when we found out the lawyer had a letter written in English that they wanted him to sign admitting that there is no law in Libya and asking to be transferred to the ICC. When we searched the woman we found she had a letter from [close confidante] Mohammed Ismail for Saif and another one written back to Ismail.

They also took a number of empty papers with his signature on it, and he gave them a number of letters written by Saif for Mohammed Ismail. Before the delegation entered the meeting with Saif, we inspected them and discovered spying and recording materials on one (member) of the delegation.

The case is a homeland security issue…The lawyer should have presented the material to the prosecutor-general’s office before taking it into the suspect.

Saif would only be allowed private meetings with a lawyer if he had appointed one for himself, but in this case the ICC appointed this lawyer for him and so has no right to sit with Saif privately.”

 

The validity – or lack thereof – of these rather serious allegations remain unclear. For one, I’m very curious what “spying and recording materials” were confiscated. The use of cameras and tape recorders, for example, should not be an issue when meeting with defendants. It has also been suggested, but not confirmed, that Taylor smuggled the allegedly “dangerous” documents in her bra. Media outlets have not picked up on it, but on Twitter #ICCBra has been a trending topic. Continue reading →

Posted in Libya, Libya and the ICC | Tagged , | 4 Comments

A Disturbing Tale: Canada’s Human Rights Record and Reputation

Posted on June 7, 2012 by Mark Kersten
Canada human rights

(Photo: DJKing / Flickr)

This past week the United Nations Committee Against Torture released a report into Canada’s human rights record. It wasn’t pretty. The Committee suggested that Canada was complicit in the torture of Canadian citizens post-9/11 and expressed concern at the “apparent reluctance on part of the State party [Canada] to protect rights of all Canadians detained in other countries.” Shocking, right? Not really – not if we look closely at Canada’s recent behaviour with regards to international justice and human rights.

I should disclaim that, as a proud Canadian, this is a subject I feel very personal about. My frustrations may boil over. It is from a profound sense of patriotism and pride in Canada that I am so disappointed, sometimes infuriated, and certainly humiliated by Canada’s record.

Whenever people ask why I am proud to be Canadian, I have a ready-made answer, developed over years from practice as well as hearing why people from around the world respect Canada. I tell them that Canada is a truly multi-cultural country which initiated the creation of peacekeepers, mediated the Suez Crisis, was at the vanguard of creating the Responsibility to Protect and played a leading role in the creation of the International Criminal Court. It is a medium-power that punches well above its weight. It is a moral power that people depend upon to be in the corner of human rights and international justice. So what happened?

Not unlike other Western states, Canada got tangled in the political and ethical dilemmas characteristic of post-911 national and international security. It struggled, in particular, to balance the human and civil rights of its citizens with the prerogatives of anti-terrorist and national security measures. On a number of occasions the government decided that there was nothing to balance at all; security would come at the expense of rights. The results were disastrous. Here are but a few examples that illustrate Canada’s troubling record on respecting the civil and human rights of its citizens post 9/11.

Maher Arar: To Syria, without love – or rights

In 2002, Canadian citizen Maher Arar was deported to Syria while he was travelling through the US on his way back to Canada. US authorities believed he had terrorist links despite insufficient evidence to lay charges. The result was Arar’s extraordinary rendition to Syria where he was subsequently interrogated and tortured. While in detention, Arar maintained that he was forced to confess that he attended an al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan. Arar remained in detention for almost a year. He subsequently and successfully sued the Canadian government for $10 million.

Omar Khadr at his US military war crimes commission trial in Guantanamo Bay

Omar Khadr at his US military war crimes commission trial in Guantanamo Bay (Sketch: Janet Hamlin / AFP / Getty Images)

Omar Khadr: Canada’s Child in Guantanamo

In 2003, Omar Khadr, another Canadian citizen, was detained after allegedly killing an American medic in Afghanistan. At the time of his arrest he was 15 years old. He was then sent to the notorious American detention facility in Guantanamo Bay and has been there ever since. His detention has made a mockery of his right to a speedy trial, to due process, his civil rights as a Canadian, his human rights and, most obviously, international law, given that he is a child combatant. The UN Panel referred to “Canadian officials’ complicity in the human rights violation of Omar Khadr while detained at Guantanamo Bay.”

Even with President Obama’s plan to move detainees out of Guantanamo, Canada refused to repatriate Khadr. It has even been reported that the US had sought a Canadian request to have Khadr sent back to Canada.

Khadr eventually pleaded guilty to murder in October 2010. Part of the plea deal was an agreement that Khadr would remain in Guantanamo Bay for another year before being transferred to Canada. Incredibly, however, he remains in Guantanamo and it is unclear when Khadr, once described by Radhika Coomaraswamy, UN secretary-general’s special representative for children and armed conflict, as representing the “classic child soldier narrative” will be repatriated.

Abousfian Abdelrazik: Stuck in Sudan

The story of Abousfian Abdelrazik may read like a cruel joke. In 2003, Abdelrazik was arrested in Sudan under suspicion of being linked to al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. Despite the suspicions, no charges were ever placed on Abdelrazik by any nation, while the CSIS and the RCMP cleared him of any wrong-doing. Because he has been on an international “no-fly” lists which prevented him from taking conventional commercial flights, Abdelrazik was forced to stay in Sudan. The Sudanese government subsequently offered to fly him to Canada on a private Sudanese plane. Canada refused the offer. Fearing for his safety, Abdelrazik took refuge in the Canadian embassy in Sudan in April 2008. The Canadian government called his situation “temporary”, but he stayed for over a year. In total, Abdelrazik spent six years in forced exile in Sudan. Continue reading →

Posted in Afghanistan, Canada, Extraordinary Rendition, Guantanamo Bay, International Criminal Court (ICC), Justice, Torture, War crimes | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Politics, a Poison for Justice?

Posted on June 5, 2012 by Mark Kersten

Malawi’s new President, Joyce Banda, with UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon (Photo: Aos Gumulira / AFP / Getty Images)

Richard Dicker, the director of Human Rights Watch recently wrote an interesting op-ed in the New York Times, provocatively entitled ‘A Flawed Court in Need of Credibility‘.

Ten years ago, when the treaty creating the International Criminal Court took effect, the prospect of holding heads of state and powerful warlords to account for mass slaughter seemed like science fiction.

Today the signs carried by Syrian protesters demanding “Assad to The Hague” are powerful testimony that the court is making its presence felt.

But as the I.C.C.’s influence grows, its promise of impartial justice for the world’s worst crimes is at risk of being undercut by international politics.

Dicker’s piece succinctly evokes an ongoing debate about the relationship between politics and international criminal justice. There is a prevalent belief amongst jurists, lawyers and advocates of international criminal justice that politics is the enemy of justice. Justice, to them, requires a complete separation from political considerations. Politics and justice are like oil and water. Justice must be neutral, black-and-white, and apolitical. On the other hand, many negotiators, diplomats and scholars of international relations argue that it is naive, if not simply ridiculous, to suggest that international justice can ever be apolitical. After all, international justice will always depend on states which remain the primary political unit in the international sphere. Moreover, justice will inevitably be selective and reflect the interests of powerful stakeholder states.

Dicker, is of course, right to point out the ever-present dangers of powerful states manipulating and instrumentalizing the ICC. As readers will know, I believe that the cozy relationship between the realpolitik of the UN Security Council and the ICC poses dangers for the legitimacy of the Court. But realpolitik is not all that “international politics” is or has to be.

The problem with the debate, it seems to me, is altogether a different issue: it doesn’t allow for any space within which to argue that international criminal justice can be good politics and that good politics can guide international criminal justice. Proponents of international criminal justice shouldn’t aim to talk a separation between politics and justice into reality but rather endorse the convergence of political interests with the interests of justice, to make the political interests of states in line with effectively and appropriately responding to atrocities and combating impunity. In other words, international criminal justice is a political project; there is simply no escaping this fact. But advocates of the project don’t need to fear international politics. Rather, they should work to transform it into good politics.

Consider the example of Malawi. Just last year Malawi, a member-state of the ICC, drew the ire of the Court for hosting Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir in defiance of the ICC which had issued an arrest warrant against Bashir for his alleged role in the commission of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in Darfur. As a result, last December the ICC referred Malawi to the UN Security Council. Continue reading →

Posted in International Criminal Court (ICC), International Law, Malawi, Sudan | Tagged | 12 Comments

Thank you and Farewell from Patrick Wegner

Posted on June 4, 2012 by Patrick Wegner

Dear readers,

It is with great regret that I have to stop contributing to JiC regularly due to time constraints. I recently became a diplomat at the German Foreign Office and am trying to finish my thesis at the same time, which is very time consuming. I am therefore no longer able to contribute to JiC regularly. You will probably find a post by me every once in a while as a guest author. With Alana Tiemessen, Mark and Elke around I have no doubt that my absence will be barely felt and that JiC will be contributing meaningful commentary to international criminal law in conflicts for the months and years to come.

I would like to thank all our readers for their interest and their comments and I would like to thank the JiC team for an amazing year of blogging together.

All the best,

Patrick

Posted in JiC News | 5 Comments

Has Social Media Successfully Reinvented Social Activism?

Posted on June 2, 2012 by Mark Kersten

This week I had the honour to participate in a debate at the historic Oxford Union on whether “social media has successfully reinvented social activism”. The relationship between social media and social activism has become a critically important subject in the wake of the so-called “twitter revolutions” in Iran and Moldova, the use of blogs, Facebook and Twitter in the Arab Spring as well as Invisible Children’s KONY2012 viral campaign. Nevertheless, we are only just beginning to understand how social media in fact produces real-life results in the context of conflict, revolutions, and social upheaval.

It was a fascinating debate and a wonderful event with an impressive cast of debaters. Speaking in proposition of the motion were David Vitter, US Senator for Louisiana, Mark Pfeifle, former Deputy National Security Advisor to President George W. Bush, Benjamin Cohen, Tech Correspondent at Channel 4 News, and Ella Roberston, a student at Oxford. In opposition were Dr. Christopher Carpenter, professor of Communications at University of Western Illinois, Matt Warman, the Consumer Technology Editor at The Telegraph, Robert Sharp, Head of Campaign & Communications at English PEN, and myself. I am very happy, proud and even a bit surprised to say that the opposition was victorious.

While not directly related, in the wake of KONY2012, the question of how social media and social activism relate has been on the minds of all of us interested in international criminal justice. I therefore wanted to share with you a draft of the speech I gave on this increasingly pertinent subject. At the bottom of this post, you’ll also find a small bibliography with a few online sources which I found particularly useful in my preparation for the debate, especially for deciphering fact from fiction. As noted above, this is just the beginning of the debate. In that vein, I would love to hear what you think!

Madam President, honourable members, ladies and gentlemen,

There is no point in standing before you and denying that social media has changed how political and social activism is done. It clearly and obviously has. Despite this, social media has not, I will argue, “reinvented” the fundamental rules of social activism. To suggest so is to misunderstand what it means to do social activism and to be a social activist.

We are told a very simple story about the relationship between social media and social activism. You have all heard it. Social media topples Arab tyrants. Social media leads to democratic elections. Social media can bring rebel leaders in the heart of Africa to justice. At the core of this apparently irresistible narrative is the belief that social and political campaigns are a success when they achieve massive online traffic and “go viral”. The problem here is simple. None of the above is true.

An absolutely necessary condition for the effectiveness and success of a social campaign is building a political community of real-life, off-line physical human beings committed to a common cause.

Take for example, Invisible Children’s KONY2012 campaign. It did not go viral randomly or because of celebrity endorsements on Twitter and Facebook. Beneath this popular veneer, is the reality that Invisible Children worked for almost a decade to build a network of like-minded individuals willing to drive across Canada and the United States in order to show the group’s latest films in schools and churches. It should thus come as no surprise that KONY2012 began trending on Twitter before the campaign video itself was released – as the carefully cultivated community of Christian youths in mid-sized American cities began tweeting.

Consider too, the role of social media in the Arab Spring. It would be wrong to attribute the effectiveness and success of human rights and democracy campaigners in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Bahrain, and so on, entirely to social media. The opposition to these regimes had learned from decades of experience, training in human rights and civil disobedience.

The people who bravely marched on Tahrir Square in Cairo and Green Square in Tripoli did so not because they heard about it on Twitter but because of real grievances; because of years of outrage and humiliation; because, to them, enough was enough.

Part of the popular narrative also tells us that re-tweeters and sharers on Facebook themselves are a new breed social activists, ready at the whim to tackle tyranny and oppression, their iPads and iPhones proof of their commitment to liberal democratic values. Of course, they’re not the same type of activists. Instead, the popular and rather disparaging argument is that they are “slactivists”. Again, this is fundamentally misleading. Sharing and re-tweeting KONY2012 was a symbolic action, the merits of which we can debate. But it was symbolic action taken almost exclusively by people who were never activists in the first place. This helps to explain why Invisible Children’s campaign to “Cover the Night” – which required real activists – was such an epic flop. Continue reading →

Posted in Activism, Advocacy, Iran | Tagged , , , , | 13 Comments

ICC Prosecutor Moreno-Ocampo headed to FIFA

Posted on May 29, 2012 by Mark Kersten

FIFA President, Sepp Blatter, with former Liberian President, Charles Taylor, recently the convicted for aiding and abetting war crimes in Sierra Leone.

So that came out of left field. ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo will become FIFA’s ethics and corruption czar. As most readers will likely know, Moreno-Ocampo’s tenure at the ICC is coming to a close. In mid-June he is due to leave the Court after nine years as Prosecutor. His position at FIFA brings to an end speculations of where Moreno-Ocampo would go after a controversial but in many ways remarkable tenure at the ICC. Interestingly, Moreno-Ocampo does have a historical link to soccer/football, having been former superstar Diego Maradona’s lawyer.

Here’s from the BBC:

The Argentine is expected to be confirmed next month, and will investigate allegations of corruption or ethics rules breaches.

Ocampo’s chamber will bring charges, while a separate arm will judge cases.

In March, football’s governing body announced a wide-ranging overhaul of its governance, in light of a series of corruption allegations that have rocked the organisation over the last 18 months, concerning bothWorld Cup bidding and the presidential election.

Fifa’s single-chamber ethics committee failed to gather enough evidence to prosecute allegations of vote-rigging during the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bidding contests.

A report by Fifa’s anti-corruption adviser, Swiss professor Mark Pieth, called Fifa’s past investigation of corruption allegations “unsatisfactory”, with sanctions imposed both “insufficient and clearly unconvincing.”

A double ethics chamber, with one arm overseen by Ocampo, is an attempt to improve the efficiency and reputation of Fifa in this area.

David Bond adds that “[c]rucially, this body would have the powers to delve into the past – reopening the prospect of another more thorough examination of claims of wrongdoing during the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bidding contests.” Continue reading →

Posted in ICC Prosecutor, International Criminal Court (ICC), Sport | Tagged , , | 3 Comments