In the past week, Gambia, Burundi and South Africa joined Namibia in announcing their withdrawal from the International Criminal Court (ICC).
“The International Criminal Court charges only Africans with human rights crimes while granting impunity to U.S. officials and their allies, undermining what had been a noble idea of universal justice,” said Nicolas J S Davies, Global Research – Centre for Research on Globalization USA, on Tuesday.
His comment follows claims by several African leaders and other critics who say all of the people this court has convicted so far are Africans i.e the court has prosecuted 39 officials from eight African countries but has failed to indict a single person who is not African.
This action of African countries leaving the International Criminal Court was additionally predicted by media commentators following a dispute last year when Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir visited South Africa despite facing an ICC arrest warrant over alleged war crimes.
The High Court in Pretoria ordered the government to arrest al-Bashir, but he slipped out of the country in contravention of the court order.
Immediately after South Africa’s withdraw last week, Omar al-Bashir urged African members to follow in withdrawing from the ICC.
Earlier this month, Kenya also raised the possibility.
Henry Oryem Okello, the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, told The Associated Press on Friday that Uganda was “undecided” about whether to remain in the court, and that the “hot issue” of African participation might be taken up at an African Union summit meeting in January.
When asked by reporters for a comment on South Africa’s decision to pull out of the International Criminal Court on his arrival at Lusaka’s Kenneth Kaunda International Airport for a state visit, President Museveni said: “Very good, very good. I support it [decision]. ICC is useless.”
Up to 34 African nations voluntarily signed up to the court’s jurisdiction but in recent years a handful of regimes have decided their idea of international justice does not suit with that set out in the Rome Statute.
The African Union (AU) has urged member states not to co-operate with the ICC, accusing it of being racially biased against Africa by failing to prosecute suspected war criminals from other parts of the world.
Nevertheless, the ICC denies the allegation.
aaron@ugchristiannews.com
