Rome Statute

Are there other reasons, do you think, are there other reasons than fear that U.S. service members might be prosecuted?

Well, one of the arguments that has been made is that the Trump administration objects to the ICC investigating citizens of countries that have not ratified the Rome Statute, which would include both Israel and the United States.

But there are a couple of problems there.

One is that the United States Congress almost unanimously recently supported, endorsed the ICC's actions against Vladimir Putin, who of course is the head of state of another country, Russia, that has not ratified the Rome Statute.

So there seems a great inconsistency there.

So why really is the US position on the ICC so tough? Richard Goldberg's right-leaning Foundation for Defence of Democracies supports the US strategy.

Obviously, they still participate in the court.

We do not.

We don't have a perfect system at all, Jeremy.

We will have what one can call a universal permanent world court if all the states sign up to the Rome Statute.

And they haven't.

Big countries, in fact, three of the veto-holding states, that's Russia, China and the United States, are not parties.

What would you say directly to political leaders, Judge Pele, who believe they are above international law?

I would say you passed these laws.

You passed the Rome Statute.

You passed the Convention Against Torture, very many treaties, the Conventions on Civil and Political Rights for everyone in the world, the Convention on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

All three are also the direct result of federal governments, Liberal and Labor, disgracefully signing Australia up to idiotic international treaties when they should have known better.

The Declaration of Human Rights, the Paris Climate Agreement and the Rome Statute.

In my opinion, all three have proven to be an unmitigated disaster for Australia and have wreaked havoc on individual Australian lives.

Without getting lost in the legal weeds, I'm not a lawyer.

If we'd never signed up to that climate change nonsense in the first place, in my opinion, nearly every single Australian would today be far more relaxed, far more comfortable, and much, much wealthier.

and Ben Robert Smith.

Well, there the original sin was when Australia, under the Howard government, adopted the Rome Statute into Australian law to ensure that domestic laws were compatible with international standards.

But this required that Australian military law be compatible with the International Criminal Court, the ICC.

And that is something that I think we need to be very careful with.

I don't think we should allow diplomatic efforts to change the Statute of Rome.

We can talk about a lot of things, but actually rewriting the Statute of Rome would be a huge capitulation against this idea that somehow there are good and bad crimes against humanity, which I believe, I think we as Europeans, at least we can disagree with.

And the Statute of Rome is the treaty that set up the ICC.

Yeah.

So, I mean, going back to what you just said, it struck me, you know, a Hague Invasion Act, that's a lot for one country to potentially take on.

because they can actually turn off the light here.

Apart from that, like I said, my reading is that their goal is to make sure that the jurisdiction is limited to only signatory countries.

Rubio has argued that the court threatens American sovereignty.

Neither the United States nor Israel is a party to the Rome Statute, the treaty that created it.

EU institutions have condemned each round of U.S. measures.

In July, the 27 member states issued a declaration of support that did not name the United States.

They wanted a court that would ensure never again meant something.

The Rome Statute entered into force in 2002.

The International Criminal Court opened its doors.

And Africa celebrated.

But it marked a turning point, the moment when the AU began to openly challenge the court it had once championed.

In 2016, the frustration reached a boiling point.

South Africa announced it would withdraw from the Rome Statute.

The government argued that its obligations under the Rome Statute conflicted with its domestic laws and that it could not enforce ICC warrants without violating its own constitution.

Furthermore, it will come as no surprise that conduct amounting to one of these six grave violations against children also may be a crime under international law.

Prosecutors, of course, must deduce evidence as required by the law that governs them, whether it be the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, the charter of an internationalized or hybrid tribunal, or the duly enacted provision of a national penal code.

Okay.

If prosecutors do meet that legal burden, proof of recruitment or use, of killing or maiming, of sexual violence, of attacks on schools or hospitals, of denial of humanitarian access, or of abduction, could support convictions in one or more categories of international crimes against and affecting children.

they've given.

But of course, the United States does not sign up to the ICC part of that Rome statute, particularly under Donald Trump, who has described how he sees the court.

These moves were announced just shortly after you had been awarded the prize Donald Trump expressed dissatisfaction with your win How do you interpret his words and the timing?

I think there's some significance in the timing.

We held the inquiry.

In actual fact, those inquiries and investigations should have been held by Israel.

That's what the Rome Statute says, that prior responsibility to investigate these crimes falls on the state concerned.

I should inform you that I'm still serving as a judge ad hoc in this court where I am now, which is the International Court of Justice in The Hague.