US notes it is not obligated to arrest Bashir

March 25, 2009 (WASHINGTON) — State Department Spokesman Robert Wood said at a press briefing for the second day in a row that the United States is not obligated to arrest President Omer Al-Bashir, since it is not a state party to the treaty governing the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Al-Bashir, who is wanted by the ICC on seven counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, has just wrapped up a one-day visit to Eritrea on Monday, at the invitation of his Eritrean counterpart Issaias Afeworki.

“We are under no obligation to the ICC to arrest President Bashir. We’re not a party to the Rome Statute,” said Wood.

On the previous day, the official spokesman had also noted the same thing. However, he has also said that Al-Bashir would not be welcome on US soil.

The spokesman spoke vaguely about the need for justice and accountability, but declined to specify that Al-Bashir himself should surrender to the ICC. Wood also did not accuse Al-Bashir of any crime, even though Monday he had said “what’s going on in Darfur is genocide. There’s no question about that.”

The official position of the United States is that the ICC arrest warrant should not be linked with the expulsion of aid groups from Sudan, so Al-Bashir should allow the aid groups to return to their work regardless of the decision of the ICC.

Wood said that in recent days Secretary Hillary Clinton has not made any calls to African or Arab leaders to address the aid issue, to his knowledge, though he said other senior US officials have been making such calls with other governments.

On Monday an aid worker was shot and killed in his residence in Kango Haraza, Darfur, two days after being beaten on the head, according to the UN-African Union peacekeeping operation known as UNAMID.

(ST)