The International Criminal Court (ICC) is the first permanent, treaty based, international criminal court established to help end impunity for the perpetrators of the most serious crimes of concern to the international community. It has been established in 1998 with the adoption of the Rome Statute that entered into force in 2002 ().
The ICC is an independent international organisation, and is not part of the United Nations system. Its seat is at The Hague in the Netherlands. It is a court of last resort and only tries those accused of the gravest crimes of concern to the international community as a whole. This category includes genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, when committed after 1 July 2002.
The Court may exercise jurisdiction over such international crimes only if they were committed on the territory of a State Party or by one of its nationals. These conditions, however, do not apply if a situation is referred to the Prosecutor by the United Nations Security Council, whose resolutions are binding on all UN member states, or if a State makes a declaration accepting the jurisdiction of the Court. The Prosecutor can initiate an investigation or prosecution in three different ways: i) States Parties to the Statute of the ICC can refer situations to the Prosecutor; ii) the United Nations Security Council can request the Prosecutor to launch an investigation; iii) the Office of the Prosecutor may initiate investigations on its own initiative on the basis of information received from reliable sources with the prior authorisation from a Pre-Trial Chamber composed of three independent judges.
Victims can send information to the Prosecutor concerning crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court and have the right to participate in proceedings as well as request reparations.
Important definitions
According to the Rome Statute, “genocide” means any of the following acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group:
– killing members of the group;
– causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
– deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
– imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
– forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
“Crimes against humanity” include any of the following acts committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack:
– murder;
– extermination;
– enslavement;
– deportation or forcible transfer of population;
– imprisonment;
– torture;
– rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilization, or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity;
– persecution against an identifiable group on political, racial, national, ethnic, cultural, religious or gender grounds;
– enforced disappearance of persons;
– the crime of apartheid;
– other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great suffering or serious bodily or mental injury.
“War crimes” include grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and other serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in international armed conflict and in conflicts “not of an international character” listed in the Rome Statute, when they are committed as part of a plan or policy or on a large scale. These prohibited acts include:
– murder;
– mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
– taking of hostages;
– intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population;
– intentionally directing attacks against buildings dedicated to religion, education, art, science charitable purposes, historical monuments or hospitals;
– pillaging;
– rape, sexual slavery, forced pregnancy or any other form of sexual violence;
– conscripting or enlisting children under the age of 15 years into armed forces or groups or using them to participate actively in hostilities.