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 Post Posted: Fri Oct 21, 2016 4:40 am 
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...I have no idea what this is all about.

In short, the Minister of International Relations has given official notice of the decision to withdraw from the ICC, stating that "The Republic of South Africa has found that its obligations with respect to the peaceful resolution of conflicts at times are incompatible with the interpretation given by the international criminal court". (It's very possible that the legality of sending off this notice without getting parliament to vote on it first will be argued in the courts - just because one Minister signs it, doesn't mean that that Minister was legally allowed to sign it without getting parliamentary approval first).

Some people have also suggested that perhaps the ICC is somewhat biased against Africa, since they've only ever convicted African leaders. (Does the ICC try people for corruption, I wonder?)

The one-page document can be seen here.

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 Post Posted: Fri Oct 21, 2016 7:24 am 
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AFAIK the situation is the following:

The idea behind the ICC was, to make it inconvenient for politicans to commit war crimes (and possibly also other human rights violations). Countries join the ICC and from then on, war crimes comitted by them and on them will be investigated by the ICC and if the ICC convicted someone, all ICC members are required to arrest that politican independent of political convenience.

The problem is, that there is also the option that the UN can order the ICC to investigate certain crimes. And this has been used as political tool. We want to put preassue on Sudan so we set the ICC on Sudan. And then Sudan became more compliant and continued preassure on Sudan became inconvenient, but the ICC is a stick you can only take out of the bag, but you can't put it back in again.

I think the best solution would be to take away the option of the UN to set the ICC onto someone.

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 Post Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2016 4:19 am 
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I don't think it's simply a matter of where the ICC has been investigating. It's also partially a matter of where they haven't been investigating.

One "specialist in Middle East affairs" has written a piece on how the ICC is a problem because it doesn't investigate certain influential countries - like the U.S. for their invasion of Iraq. (To be fair, the ICC can't investigate them, because the U.S. has not signed on to the ICC. But that's kind of his point; he sees it as a case of one law for the rich and influential and another, stricter law for the... less influential). So, arguments can be made that it's the right thing to do.

But there are also arguments that can be made in favour of staying in the ICC. Yes, nine of the ten investigations undertaken by the ICC are in Africa; but six of those nine were referred by African governments themselves. It's not as simple as saying that the ICC is biased against Africa; apparently:

Quote:
And aside from that, El Abdallah points out, “there have been no referrals by the UN Security Council or by state parties [of the court] outside Africa,” except for one from Palestine last year.


(As the fellow in favour of withdrawing from the ICC points out, this may be partially because of overuse of veto powers preventing UN resolutions to investigate certain countries).

Like it or not, though, the ICC has performed a role, and there doesn't appear to be any reasonable replacement handy.

--------------

But aside from the matter of whether or not withdrawing is the right action to take, there is also the question of whether or not said withdrawal was done correctly. The opposition party says no, it should have gone through Parliament first. Mind you, the ANC has a strong majority in Parliament, so it's likely that getting it through Parliament won't be hard (though the DA is definitely the sort to hound them on any i's left undotted or t's left uncrossed). The ANC's claim is that they are quite in the right to do the withdrawing on their own account; but making changes to the relevant Act will be a matter for Parliament to deal with, and is on their agenda (or will be soon).

It seems that the ANC's main problem with the ICC goes back to Omar Al Bashir (Sudanese President) who came onto South African soil for a summit, and then left without being arrested, despite an ICC warrant out against him. There's apparently conflicting legislation on the matter; the ICC bill said he should be arrested, while another bill said that, as a visiting head of state on official business, he had a very strong diplomatic immunity. The ANC has chosen the side of said diplomatic immunity, claiming that it's hard to broker a peace between warring states when you can't invite the heads of both states into your country for talks on neutral ground without arresting one or both of them; and this is why they want to leave the ICC. (I'm not sure I agree with their reasons, but I have to say they present much better reasons for this decision than they have for some of their previous decisions).

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 Post Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2016 12:52 pm 
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It seems like almost all the signatory countries, that have wars in their territory are African, so it's no wonder most investigations are in Africa.

Yes the US not being a signatory is a bad thing. But i think it's still the best way to push the US towards joining, if you attempt to get pretty much everyone else on board.

And IIRC the ICC can investigate non members, if they are accused of a war crime on the territory of a member. So in a way being a member could protect you against US warcrimes if the US attack you.

The specific problem with Sudan IIRC however is one, where the UN security council ordered the investigation of a non member, which is a somewhat arbitrary process open to political machinations.

If it's about the heads of state of memberstates getting convicted, i can see the point. It also protects thoose states from getting a war criminal as head of state, because if having such a head of state is inconvenient and embarassing, the powers that be in thoose countries, will be dicouraged from installing a known war criminal, but rather look for a different figurehead. So i guess cases where this really clashes with politics will not be very often.

On the other hand, if ICC investigation on non members are started by fiat of the UN security council, then there will be no such preperation by the elites of that country, and so you will often run headlong into escalations, that are later difficult to deescalate.

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 Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 5:50 am 
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arcosh wrote:
Yes the US not being a signatory is a bad thing. But i think it's still the best way to push the US towards joining, if you attempt to get pretty much everyone else on board.


How long did it take the US to ratify their signature on the Kyoto protocol to reduce greenhouse gas emissions? I think they still haven't, have they?

...I don't believe that peer pressure works on the U.S. government.

Which isn't a bad thing, in and of itself, but it does mean that signing on to the ICC in the hope of getting the U.S. to also sign on is probably not going to get you anywhere.

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 Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 10:26 pm 
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CCC wrote:
Which isn't a bad thing, in and of itself, but it does mean that signing on to the ICC in the hope of getting the U.S. to also sign on is probably not going to get you anywhere.

Bribery is a lot more likely to work.

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 Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 11:17 pm 
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The South African economy poses enough to corruption that I'm not sure we could afford said bribe. And I'm not sure it would be the best use of said money if we could.

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