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U.S.
to “Unsign” International Criminal Court Treaty
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Powell: We have
problems with the International Criminal Court
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WASHINGTON,
May 6 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - The United States will
notify the United Nations on Monday, May 6, that it is withdrawing
from a treaty that created the International Criminal Court because
the tribunal is not accountable to any authority and could
second-guess U.S. courts, senior U.S. officials said.
"We
will notify the United Nations today [Monday]," one senior State
Department official told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on condition of
anonymity. "We will deposit a notice in New York stating our
intentions.
"It
will be like a demarche," the official said, using the term of
art for a formal diplomatic note.
A
second official said an announcement of the decision would be made by
the number three U.S. diplomat, Under Secretary of State for Political
Affairs Marc Grossman, in a speech to the Center for Strategic and
International Studies (CSIS), a Washington-based think-tank, later
Monday.
Secretary
of State Colin Powell, speaking Sunday on ABC television's "This
Week" program, said the decision to "unsign" the treaty
could be announced as early as Monday.
"Since
we have no intention of ratifying it," Powell said, "it is
appropriate for us, because we have such serious problems with the
ICC, to notify the depository, secretary general, that we do not
intend to ratify it, and therefore we are no longer bound in any way
to its purpose and objective."
The
court is being created under a 1998 Rome agreement signed by countries
eager to set up an international body to prosecute genocide, war
crimes and crimes against humanity.
Many
legal experts argue an international criminal court is the missing
link in the international legal system because the existing
International Court of Justice at The Hague handles only litigation
between states, not individuals.
Currently,
Slobodan Milosevic and members of his government are being tried in
The Hague for their roles in the massacres and ethnic cleansing of
Muslims during the Serbian/Bosnian conflict.
Israeli
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is also being charged in a Belgian court
with war crimes for his role in the Sabra and Shatilla refugee camp
massacre in 1982.
However,
the charges against Sharon are not yet being presented in an
international court.
Its
absence has allowed many crimes against humanity like the killing of
an estimated two million people in Cambodia in the 1970s to go
unpunished, these experts say.
Former
U.S. President Bill Clinton signed the accord on behalf of the United
States on December 31, 2000, but, due to overwhelming opposition in
Congress, he never submitted it for ratification.
Members
of the U.S. Congress, where support for the treaty remains very low on
both sides of the aisle, have insisted the court could be used by
critics of the United States against American servicemen participating
in military operations overseas.
To
date, 66 nations have ratified the international statute, six more
than required to trigger its entry into force.
The
court will come into being July 1, and is expected to be ready to
start work in The Hague early next year.
At
the same time, Powell pointed out that the United State had supported
the international tribunals for the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and is
trying to set up a court to hear cases stemming from the conflict in
Sierra Leone.
The
U.S. decision drew sharp criticism from 23 prominent human rights
advocates, including Jesse Jackson and Amnesty International-USA
Director Bill Shultz, who called it rash, arguing that the United
States was "turning its back on decades of US leadership in
prosecuting war criminals since the Nuremberg trials."
"Unsigning
is an unprecedented act that has little practical effect, but is
symbolically powerful because it undermines American leadership and
credibility at the worst possible time," the group said in a
statement.
An
opinion poll conducted last month for the Lawyers Committee for Human
Rights showed that 54 percent of Americans believed that the U.S.
government should change its current position on the court.
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