HUMAN RIGHTS

International Criminal law Assignment

International Criminal law Assignment

Introduction to International Criminal Law

International criminal law is an autonomous branch of law which deals with international crimes and the courts and tribunals set up to adjudicate cases in which persons have incurred international criminal responsibility. It represents a significant departure from 'classical' international law which was mainly considered law created by states for the benefit of states, but tended to ignore the individual as a subject of the law.

Brief History History

Some precedents in international criminal law can be found in the time before the First World War. However, it was only after the war that a truly international criminal tribunal was envisaged to try perpetrators of crimes committed in this period. Thus, the Treaty of Versailles stated that an international tribunal was to be set up to try Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. In the event however, the Kaiser was granted asylum in the Netherlands. After the Second World War, the Allied powers set up an international tribunal to try not only war crimes, but crimes against humanity committed under the Nazi regime. The Nuremberg Tribunal held its first session on 20 November 1945 and pronounced judgments on 30 September / 1 October 1946. A similar tribunal was established for Japanese war crimes (The International Military Tribunal for the Far East). It operated from 1946 to 1948. After the beginning of the war in Bosnia, the United Nations Security Council established the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in 1993 and, after the genocide in Rwanda, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in 1994. The International Law Commission had commenced preparatory work for the establishment of a permanent International Criminal Court in 1993; in 1998, at a Diplomatic Conference in Rome, the Rome Statute establishing the ICC was signed. The ICC issued its first arrest warrants in 2005.

Leading Cases and their Analysis And Critique

Human rights are conceived of as rights held by individuals vis-á-vis the State, and they create legal obligations, both positive and negative in nature, on part of the State to ensure the full enjoyment of these rights. The State is then arguably also the only entity, which can be responsible for human rights violations. Nevertheless, measures taken by other actors can also violate human rights. After the Second World War, large-scale victimizations of civilians have often been committed by non-state actors5, such as paramilitary units, armed civilian bands and even children. In the last decade we have also witnessed attacks on civilian populations, campaigns of ethnic cleansing and even genocides that have been perpetrated by militias, insurgent groups or other non-state actors. The threat posed by non-state actors have become so frequent that Kälin claims that the majority of refugees are today fleeing violence emanating from non-state actors.6

During the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, most of the atrocities falling within the definition of crimes against humanity were according to Bassiouni perpetrated by such paramilitary groups or armed civilian bands. Moreover, the Hutu civilians were incited to kill ...