British official denies plans to freeze ICC indictment of Sudan’s Bashir
September 18, 2008 (WASHINGTON) — The United Kingdom has no plans of supporting a suspension of the International Criminal Court (ICC) indictment against Al-Bashir, a senior British official said today.
The newspaper said that officials from both capitals informed human rights activists that they have taken this stance to protect the peace process in Darfur and Southern Sudan.
“There was a rather inaccurate press story about this last weekend” Lord Malloch Brown UK Foreign Office Minister for Africa said yesterday during forum at the Frontline Club in London.
“I think it is a very bad idea [suspension]…We are extremely wary of doing anything to interfere with the independence of the ICC. We look at it as one of the most important international innovation of recent years” Brown said.
The British official said he told Sudan that “there is no bargaining” before adding that London “cannot sellout the International Court or the justice system”.
Brown said it is up to Sudan to convince the UN Security Council (UNSC) that is undertaking a “fundamental change…in addressing the internal issues of justice, politics, peacekeeping, but we have not seen that”.
“If you showed a willingness to really engage with the other two people who had been indicted who are still enjoying senior government jobs. If you really now turned around helped get UNAMID fully deployed and if you also engage in a no-hole barred effort with the rebel groups to do a peace agreement then you would face a completely different environment in the UN Security Council” he added.
The British minister said that on the issues of the two Sudanese suspects indicted by the ICC previously, the UNSC has been held “hostage” to Sudan wanting to see UNAMID force deployed and political negotiations between the government and rebels.
However he acknowledged that Al-Bashir’s indictment does not have the support of African leaders who he said feel that the ICC is “is real intrusion of Western institution into Africa’s affairs where you can start indicting African leaders while in office.”.
“They [African leaders] say who is next? It is not that they think Bashir is not guilty of things. But they could imagine circumstances that some smooth well spoken opposition leader fooling Westerners into thinking that they were human right abusers right or wrong and then suddenly there was an indictment against them”.
In mid-July the ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo announced that he is seeking an arrest warrant for Al-Bashir.
The ICC’s prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo filed 10 charges: three counts of genocide, five of crimes against humanity and two of murder. Judges are expected to take months to study the evidence before deciding whether to order Al-Bashir’s arrest.
Sudan and a number of regional organizations including the African Union (AU), Arab League, Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) and Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) condemned Ocampo’s request and called on the UN Security Council (UNSC) resolution deferring Al-Bashir’s indictment.
Article 16 of the Rome Statute allows the UNSC to suspend the ICC prosecutions in any case for a period of 12 months that can be renewed indefinitely.
Sudan has not ratified the Rome Statute, but the UNSC triggered the provisions under the Statute that enables it to refer situations in non-State parties to the world court if it deems that it is a threat to international peace and security.
(ST)