Search: Complementarity SAIF GADDAFI

...a few others, have attracted the most attention in scholarship on the law governing the use of force by states. One region that has received lesser attention is Africa. This is unfortunate because recent developments in Africa are challenging some of the cardinal principles of jus ad bellum. The unfolding crisis in The Gambia is one example. Adama Barrow, a real estate developer, defeated long-term incumbent Yahya Jammeh in the presidential election held on December 1st, 2016. Unexpectedly for an eccentric Gaddafi-like authoritarian leader, who vowed to rule The Gambia...

When I wrote my account of Melinda Taylor and her team’s detention, I somehow missed this gem in the OPCD’s response: 381. The inability of the particular prosecution authorities assigned to the case of Mr. Gaddafi to conduct credible or effective investigations and prosecutions is amply demonstrated by the fact that these same prosecution authorities claimed that an ordinary swatch watch worn by the ICC interpreter, was in fact a ‘spy watch’ (with video or GPS capabilities so hidden that even she and the swatch makers were unaware of them),...

...primary obligation to investigate and prosecute its nationals who commit crimes under international law in Afghanistan, the ICC may not have cause to investigate US citizens. Finally, the ICC must develop a backbone in dealing with powerful countries like the US and UK. The OTP stretched the doctrine of complementarity to its very limits, when it decided that the domestic processes in the UK which led to zero prosecutions, were sufficient to avert an investigation by the court. Similarly, the Court’s decision to “deprioritise” the investigation of the US activities...

...crucial question is the role of regional organizations in international criminal justice. After the end of the Cold War, institutional development has quickly shifted from domestic to universal approaches. The role of regional institutions has long remained at the periphery. Recently, much attention has been devoted to regionalization in the context of African critiques of international criminal justice, and the Malabo Protocol. While the Protocol has many problems (e.g., in relation to crime base, complementarity or immunities), there seems to be at least some support for the general assumption that...

...the Court has been or is being committed”; (2) admissibility is not an issue; and (3) there are no “substantial reasons to believe that an investigation would not serve the interests of justice.” There is no question that the OTP’s request for authorization satisfies requirements 1 and 3, and it cannot seriously be argued that complementarity — the first aspect of the admissibility requirement — counsels against opening the Afghanistan investigation. As the request itself notes, none of the relevant parties (the Afghan government, the US government, and the armed...

[Owiso Owiso is a Doctoral Researcher in Public International Law at the University of Luxembourg.] Those Sanctioned… and Those Not Sanctioned The Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) of the International Criminal Court (ICC) as currently structured has five persons at the helm, the Prosecutor, Deputy Prosecutor and three division directors (investigations; jurisdiction, complementarity and cooperation (JCCD); and prosecutions). Two of these persons, the Prosecutor Ms Fatou Bensouda and Director of JCCD Mr Phakiso Mochochoko, are racialised as Black. They are also the only nationals of African states at the helm...

...international climate change law is not enough to address the climate change crisis. Pacific Island countries should support the criminalizing of ecocide to ensure there is attention to prosecute natural persons and corporate entities that prevent reducing greenhouse gas emissions (see, for example, Taylor and Watts 2019). The ICC has a reserve justice mechanism. It is an institution established to end impunity, premised on the principle of complementarity as stipulated under Article 17 of the Rome Statute. Countries that are State Parties to the Rome Statute have to investigate and...

...commit the US internationally and Julian found a workaround toward a legally binding solution via a Security Council resolution on the matter. Kevin added a few of his thoughts on the recent domestic conviction by the Ivory Coast of Simone Gbagbo and complementarity at the ICC, and offered a mea culpa on the Israeli attacks on Hezbollah in 2006. Finally, Tom Ruys offered a response to a recent discussion with his guest post on self-defense and non-state actors in the Cold War Era. We saw a lot of discussion on...

...Gary Goertz and James Mahoney, A Tale of Two Cultures: Qualitative and Quantitative Inquiry in the Social Sciences (2012). We ourselves have been skeptical of the extent of this purported divide, as our prior collective and individual work has sought to integrate the strengths of the two approaches. Professor Christopher Roberts’ thoughtful comments on our article demonstrate, in our view, the basic complementarity of the methodologies. Our article demonstrates a set of statistical relationships that are consistent with the interpretation that we give them: that constitutional and international rights are...

...far more conservative approach to case selection, the processes of preliminary examination and complementarity means that the Court is not designed to have its success measured purely by the number of cases it completes, but also whether its presence can encourage effective domestic prosecutions, and some may argue serve as a deterrent. A simple data comparison of successful prosecutions to illustrate effectiveness therefore ignores that the ‘objective’ by which effectiveness is measured against, differs between the three organisations. The budget issue is in essence not new, but it is vital...

...2025, the Iranian government submitted the IDBIC to the Islamic Consultative Assembly (Majlis) for legislative consideration. The Bill must be situated within this global movement towards the nationalisation of ICL. Its preamble explicitly frames the initiative as a response to the international community’s rejection of impunity for perpetrators of core international crimes, emphasising that the globalisation of ICL—particularly through the adoption of the Rome Statute and its principle of complementarity—has provided the normative basis for national criminalisation.   The preamble further grounds the Bill in Islamic and constitutional principles. It highlights...

...the case under Article 17 of the Rome Statute. With regard to complementarity (Art. 53(1)(b) of the Statute), both Georgia and Russia have had sufficient time to undertake national investigations of conflict related crimes – more than 7 years. On the one hand, while the Russian Federation authorities have shown to be willing and able to conduct national proceedings (para. 50), the Court could not conclusively decide on the question regarding their inability to access crucial evidence (para. 46). On the other hand, the Georgian authorities seemed to have been...