Legal News

ICC Prosecutor Broadening Prosecution of Darfur Conflict

By Dan Slater

On Wednesday afternoon, we hoofed it up to Kelley Drye & Warren’s midtown offices to sit in on a summer associate event. But rather than canapes and cocktails, the purpose of this gathering was foreign law — specifically, Liberia’s attempt to revamp its post-civil-war court system.

Liberia’s chief justice, Johnnie N. Lewis was there to answer questions about the country’s new constitution (he says it’s too long), Liberia as a home for foreign investment (he says the court will adjudicate any business dispute that comes before it), and the method of appointing judges (nominated by the president with the consent of the senate).

On that same day, the news pages were brimming with criticism over the International Criminal Court’s decision to seek an arrest warrant for Omar Bashir, the president of Sudan, on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity. Russia, China, the WSJ editorial board, and some African countries, had all challenged the move on different grounds. So we asked Chief Justice Nelson what he thought, and he responded that, if the allegations amount to genocide, then he supports the move.

Yesterday, ignoring all criticism, it seems, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, Argentina’s Luis Moreno-Ocampo, announced that he was broadening his prosecution of the conflict in Darfur to focus on the rebels thought to be responsible for a deadly attack on international peacekeepers in September. Here’s the NYT report.

Moreno-Ocampo, who spoke at a news conference on Thursday to mark the 10th anniversary of the treaty establishing the ICC, said he had the names of two commanders suspected of being responsible for the attack, in which 10 African Union peacekeepers were killed. He urged the rebels to cooperate in the investigation. According to the NYT, he suggested that he would also look into a recent attack in which seven members of the joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force were killed.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on July 18, 2008 (boomark / email).