Professor Sadat's book is a valuable "restatement" of international criminal law, discovering and delineating the process that led the United Nations from Nuremberg to the Rome Statute of an International Criminal Court. "With the establishment of the International Criminal Court we enter an exciting era in the development of internatonal criminal law. This well written and thoroughly researched work provides a comprehensive and insightful analysis and critique of the Rome Statute and the impact of prosecuting war criminals" -- Justice Richard Goldstone Published under the Transnational Publishers imprint.
Professor Sadat's book is a valuable "restatement" of international criminal law, discovering and delineating the process that led the United Nations from Nuremberg to the Rome Statute of an International Criminal Court. "With the establishment of the International Criminal Court we enter an exciting era in the development of internatonal criminal law. This well written and thoroughly researched work provides a comprehensive and insightful analysis and critique of the Rome Statute and the impact of prosecuting war criminals" -- Justice Richard Goldstone Published under the Transnational Publishers imprint.
This book is about the International Criminal Court (ICC), a new and highly distinctive criminal justice institution with the ability to prosecute the highest-level government officials, including heads of state, even in countries that have not accepted its jurisdiction. The book explores the historical development of international criminal law and the formal legal structure created by the Rome Statute, against the background of the Court’s search for objectivity in a political global environment. The book reviews the operations of the Court in practice and the Court’s position in the power politics of the international system. It discusses and clarifies all stages of an international criminal proceeding from the opening of the investigation to sentencing, reparations, and final appeals in the context of its restorative justice mission. Making appropriate comparisons and contrasts between the international criminal justice system and domestic and national systems, the book fills a gap in international criminal justice study.
Until recently, and with a few notable exceptions in the wake of World War II, violations of the laws of war and international humanitarian law were addressed primarily as claims between states. However, this approach has changed radically in the last twenty years, as the international community has increasingly accepted the idea of individual criminal responsibility for violations of international humanitarian law. The International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda have played a key role in this transformation and, as the trailblazers for a growing number of new international or hybrid criminal courts, in establishing the field of international criminal justice and encouraging the national prosecution of war crimes. Understanding the Tribunals' origins, their ground-breaking jurisprudence, and how they have addressed critical legal and practical challenges is essential to understanding both the revolution that has occurred over the past twenty years and how international criminal law will change and grow in the years ahead. As a leading scholar on humanitarian law, and President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, Theodor Meron has observed and influenced the development of international criminal law as it has evolved from a mostly academic exercise to a cornerstone of the new international legal order. In this collection of speeches delivered during his first decade on the bench, he offers an insightful overview of the foundations of international criminal law as well as a unique insider's perspective on the challenges faced by international criminal tribunals, their creation of a corpus of substantive and procedural law, and the responsibilities of international jurists. Judge Meron's experience in international criminal justice makes this volume as rewarding for experts as it is for the general public.
This collection identifies and discusses problems and opportunities for the theory and practice of international criminal justice. The International Criminal Court and project of prosecuting international atrocity crimes have faced multiple challenges and critiques. In recent times, these have included changes in technology, the conduct of armed conflict, the environment, and geopolitics. The mostly emerging contributors to this collection draw on diverse socio-legal research frameworks to discuss proposals for the futures of international criminal justice. These include addressing accountability gaps and under-examined or emerging areas of criminality at, but also beyond, the International Criminal Court, especially related to technology and the environment. The book discusses the tensions between universalism and localisation, as well as the regionalisation of international criminal justice and how these approaches might adapt to dynamic organisational, political and social structures, at the ICC and beyond. The book will be of interest to students, researchers and academics. It will also be a useful resource for civil society representatives including justice advocates, diplomats and other government officials and policy-makers.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) is the first permanent international criminal tribunal, which has jurisdiction over the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and crime of aggression. This book critically analyses the law and practice of the ICC and its contribution to the development of international criminal law and policy. The book focuses on the key procedural and substantive challenges faced by the ICC since its establishment. The critical analysis of the normative framework aims to elaborate ways in which the Court may resolve difficulties, which prevent it from reaching its declared objectives in particularly complex situations. Contributors to the book include leading experts in international criminal justice, and cover a range of topics including, inter alia, terrorism, modes of liability, ne bis in idem, victims reparations, the evidentiary threshold for the confirmation of charges, and sentencing. The book also considers the relationship between the ICC and States, and explores the impact that the new regime of international criminal justice has had on countries where the most serious crimes have been committed. In drawing together these discussions, the book provides a significant contribution in assessing how the ICC’s practice could be refined or improved in future cases. The book will be of great use and interest to international criminal law and public international law.
This book sets out an agenda to transform international criminal trials and the delivery of international criminal justice to victim communities through collaboration of currently competing paradigms. It reflects a transformation of thinking about the comparative analysis of the trial process, and seeks to advance the boundaries of international criminal justice through wider access and inclusivity in an environment of rights protection.Collaborative justice is advanced as providing the future context of international criminal trials. The book's radical dimension is its argument for the harmonization of restorative and retributive justice within the international criminal trial. The focus is initially on the trial process, a key symbol of developing international styles of justice. It examines theoretical models and political applications of criminal justice through detailed empirical analysis, in order to explore the underlying relationship of theory and empirical study, applying the outcome in theory testing and policy evaluation in several different jurisdictions. The book injects a significant comparative dimension into the study of international criminal justice.This is achieved through searching the traditional foundations of internationalism in justice by employing an original methodology to enable a multi-dimensional exploration of contexts (local, regional and global), so recognising the importance of difference within an agenda suggesting synthesis.The book argues for a concept of international trial within a 'rights paradigm', understood against different procedural traditions and practices, and provides a detailed description of trials and trial decision-making in various jurisdictions. Transforming International Criminal Justice also sets out to develop effective research strategies as part of its interrogation of specific trial narratives and meanings in contemporary legal cultures. Key themes are those of internationalisation, fair trial and the exercise of discretion in justice resolutions (sentencing in particular), and the lay/professional relationship and its dynamics. Finally, the book provides a searching critique of the relevance of existing criminology and legal sociology in relation to international criminal justice, and speculates on trial transformation and the merger of retributive and restorative international criminal justice. comparative analysis of the criminal trial process internationallyargues for harmonization of retributive and restorative justice within the international criminal trialsets out an agenda to transform international criminal trials and the delivery of international criminal justice to victim communities
The International Criminal Court ushers in a new era in the protection of human rights. The Court will prosecute genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes when national justice systems are either unwilling or unable to do so themselves. This third revised edition considers the initial rulings by the Pre-Trial Chambers and the Appeals Chamber, and the cases it is prosecuting, namely, Democratic Republic of Congo, northern Uganda, Darfur, as well as those where it had decided not to proceed, such as Iraq. The law of the Court up to and including its ruling on a confirmation hearing, committing Chalres Lubanga for trial on child soldiers offences, is covered. It also addresses the difficulties created by US opposition, analysing the ineffectiveness of measures taken by Washington to obstruct the Court, and its increasing recognition of the inevitability of the institution.
This collection discusses appropriate methodologies for comparative research and applies this to the issue of trial transformation in the context of achieving justice in post-conflict societies. In developing arguments in relation to these problems, the authors use international sentencing and the question of victims' interests and expectations as a focus. The conclusions reached are wide-ranging and haighly significant in challenging existing conceptions for appreciating and giving effect to the justice demands of victims of war and social conflict. The themes developed demonstrate clearly how comparative contextual analysis facilitates our understanding of the legal and social contexts of international punishment and how this understanding can provide the basis for expanding the role of restorative international criminal justice within the context of international criminal trials.
