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African Union Says 'Up Yours' to International Criminal Court
The African Union found the spine to reject execution of an arrest warrant against Libyan Leader Muammar Gaddafi issued by the International Criminal Court, which appears to have an “Africans only” indictment policy. The AU’s chairman calls the court’s prosecutions “discriminatory” because they ignore the West’s crimes in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq. China has hosted Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, another ICC arrest target.
The African Union is asking all of its 53 members not to buckle under to the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. The International Criminal Court, or ICC, has never indicted anyone but Africans, and many consider it to be a tool of the United States. The Obama administration gives constant lip service to the Court, even though the U.S. is not a member of the ICC and has refused to make its own policies and military answerable to any outside authority.
The African Union, meeting in Equatorial Guinea, said the ICC indictment against Gaddafi for alleged “crimes against humanity” complicates the task of bringing about a cease-fire in Libya. Twice, high level African delegations have attempted to forge a cease-fire, that would protect immigrant workers and refugees and allow for humanitarian aid to the civilian population. Both times, the rebels and their American and European backers rejected the African initiative out of hand – a display of western arrogance that was deeply humiliating to the African Union. The insult still stings. Although the African Union can’t do much to stop NATO from bombing an African nation at will, the AU decided, finally, that it can stand up to the International Criminal Court and its attempt to arrest Gaddafi, a former chairman and great benefactor of the African Union.
The current AU chairman, Jean Ping, spoke for many member states when he said that the ICC “was discriminatory” in its prosecutions, and only went after Africans, disregarding crimes committed by the West in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq. For that reason, the AU recommended that its members not cooperate with the execution of the warrant against Gaddafi.
Without doubt, the International Criminal Court is as Eurocentric in its view of the world as are the governments in Paris, London and Washington. So is the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, who had the nerve to chastise China for ignoring the ICC indictment against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. Bashir has travelled in Africa and the Middle East on state visits, and went to China for high level talks, last week. Navi Pillay, the Human Rights Commissioner, whined that she was disappointed with China for not arresting Bashir – although China, like the United States and Russia, is not a member of the International Criminal Court.
Nevertheless, Pillay showed herself to be a true servant of the West. “The whole world favors” putting Bashir on trial,” said the bureaucrat. Most of the continent of Africa does not want to put Bashir on trial. Isn't Africa part of the world? China does not want to put Bashir on trial. And one out of every five people in the world is Chinese!
Navi Pillay is herself from South Africa, whose president, Jacob Zuma, is trying to engage the Russians in arranging a Libya ceasefire. But Human Rights Commissioner Pillay thinks the whole world revolves around Paris, London and Washington. So does ICC chief prosecutor Luis Morena Ocampo, who wants to deputize the United States military to enforce the criminal court's arrest warrants – regardless of what the African world or the Chinese world or anybody that is not European or American thinks. It's sad to say, but at this point in history, the UN serves the Empire.
26 Comments so far
Show AllThere so much to think of, so much to do...
Thank you for this post, Glen Ford.
http://www.sildenafil4u.com/
sorry, i post my comment twice)
This court is just another arm of western imperialism and should be discredited by people with a conscience everywhere. When they put Bush and Blair on trial let me know.
Right on.
you got that right thal
the trial of slobodan milosevic was a farce that has forever shamed european jurisprudence
to call it a kangaroo court is an insult to kangaroos
watch this part of his trial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmfoNuS_3og
he destroyed the prosecutors case despite countless interventions from the judge against him. the judge even criticized him for things he thought he was going to say - reminded me of the trial of jean valjean
http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0014450/bio
then when the case was hopelessly lost - milosevic "developed cancer" from which he died while in custody - he was refused treatment
the icc is a cruel joke and if they took their work seriously the docket would be full of people like: blair, bush (both of them), clinton (both of them), rumsfeld, feith, cheney, wolfowicz, albright, rice, etc
netanbooboo, sharon, also come to mind
these folks are the real terrorists and war criminals
You state the obvious. Thank you. Indict Obama, too, for his part in the cover ups and continuation of American war crimes.
I applaud the AU. Refuse to be bullied. Keep AfriCom out of Africa.
Good for them! the EU is as whimsically selective in its application of international law as is the US.
Oh - how about correcting the spelling of the link in the footnote.
Are these the same people who gave Obomber the Nobel Peace Prize?
No.
Africa has to follow the lead of Latin America and rid themselves of the Imperialist powers once and for all. Until Western Leaders like a Barack Obama are indited by this same court for war crimes and crimes against Humanity, then it remains a farce and little more then another way to keep countries in Africa under the boot of Fascists.
This has been my position right along. The ICC is a kangaroo court working in the interests of US imperialism and its European lackies. Fuck the ICC.
It is was a signatory under Clinton, but the treaty was never presented for ratification because there was no chance for it to pass in the Senate. When GWB took over, he "un-signed" the treaty.
There are 116 countries that have signed the Rome Treaty, but the US, Russia, China and India are all non-ratified although the Russians have signed but not ratifed. All in all about half the world's population is under protection of the ICC and half is not.
By statute of the treaty, actions in non-member countries or by citizens of non-member states cannot be referred to the ICC except by the UN Security Council.
As half the planet is not subject to the ICC, it really is just another high cost appendage of the UN without purpose.
A resounding right on to the African Union!!!!
I am so happy that it is not taking these US-Euro imperialist double standards any more.
Expose the massive hypocrisy and criminality of the US and its European servants (the Brits in first position of indentured servitude, Sarkozy, Berlusconi, and so on).
Good for the African Union! Stay strong!
Bravo African Union, bravo Glen Ford. The more people stand up to the imperialists, the quicker there'll be justice in the world.
I agree with almost all of the comments posted so far.
In school, when I first learned about organizations like the United Nations and became loosely acquainted with the concept of "international law", I naïvely assumed or hoped that it was a breakthrough for manunkind.
Of course, at the time I was similarly enamored by the "United Federation of Planets" on "Star Trek".
These endeavors seemed to be an attempt to rise "above the fray" and establish a respectable, reliable authority that could in theory intervene constructively to "trump" narrow nationalistic and economic self-interest and sort out abiding conflicts rooted in small-minded, selfish pettiness.
Only later did I come to understand that it would take a coercive supernatural power, or extraterrestrial influence like Klaatu and Gort to impose the "greater good" I envisioned-- that international authorities and organizations would necessarily be corrupted and manipulated by powerful constituent members and keep us right back in the behavioral sink of Square One.
It flashed upon me momentarily that, had the ICC existed at the time, it probably would've indicted Ho Chi Minh during the Vietnam War. But of course, that's wrong-- it wouldn't have dared to provoke Mao's "Red" China by doing so.
The ICC only indicts alleged super-villains who AREN'T well-connected, including those who've become persona non grata spurned by their former allies and sponsors or patrons.
The one African, okay, half-African I'd like to see the ICC indict is BHO.
Good news.
Africa Unite!
Glen Ford: I appreciate your incisive writing and courageously honest perspectives. It's good to see other global entities resisting the empire's dominion and selective enforcement of those rules and laws that are allegedly universal in nature.
I checked the allegation. Indeed all 26 investigations of the ICC have been of citizens of African nations. However, there are active preliminary investigations against citizens of Colombia, Iraq, Venezuela, Afghanistan, Georgia, Palestine, Honduras, Nigeria, and the Republic of Korea but none of this changes my opinion that this is a kangaroo court that does the bidding of a number of well-known countries whose leaders ought to be prime candidates on a "wanted for murder and/or torture list".
This is great information for everybody. Do you mind citing the source for this information?
I find it horrific yet completely predictable that every one of the nations you listed, (aside from Columbia which I'm presuming is its ex-president Pastrana who refused to extradite "drug traffickers" in 2000) are nations hostile to western capitalist imperialism.
People need to be aware of such information.
This blog is not telling the whole story. Why are Ping and some African states defending a tyrannical leader that threatened to kill civilians indiscriminately, is alleged to have ordered his henchmen to use rape as a weapon, and prohibits the people’s right to protest?
This post also forgets that Africa has the most signatories to the Rome Statute that created the ICC and is the most well-represented continent of all members party to the agreement.
To read another perspective on this issue, visit: http://globalsolutions.org/blog/2011/07/african-union-chairman-ping-and-libya-warrants.