Another Perspective
Bashing Omar al-Bashir
How the International Criminal Court could fail Darfur.
He is hurt, angry and hunted by the International Criminal Court. He is also the first sitting president of a country to be issued with ICC arrest warrants — in March this year. Amid resplendent chandeliers, I visited Sudan’s president, Omar al-Bashir, in his palace in Khartoum in April.
Eschewing his field-marshal’s uniform, and wearing traditional white flowing robes and a turban, the President said: “When Morgan Tsvangirai raised his hand to take the oath of office in the Zimbabwean government of national unity — with Robert Mugabe — all the international pressures and legal threats were forgotten. Maybe I should ask Tsvangirai to raise his hand here as well?”
Africa has many nasty despots, including Mugabe, so why is the ICC concentrating on Bashir? Does its selectivity conjure up suspicions of political targeting by the West? And what will be the results of ICC intervention?
Political Target?
Bashir is accused, inter alia, of war crimes in Darfur. Whereas the government in Khartoum says the Court’s ambitions are political, not legal: regime change in another oil-rich Islamic country. Many African leaders, even those who disdain Bashir, are outraged that all the indictments have been in Africa. Besides the Sudan, the ICC has intervened in Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central African Republic.
Khartoum argues that the ICC has no legal right to intervene in Sudan, which is not a signatory to the Rome Statute which established the Court in 2002. Moreover, say Bashir’s lawyers, he has sovereign immunity as head of state. Further, they say, the ICC — while claiming universal jurisdiction — is simply not international. Less than 27% of the world’s population comes under its jurisdiction, and this excludes, for example, the U.S., Russia, China, and India.
Many African leaders caricature the ICC as neo-colonialism, white man’s justice, especially French, German and British meddling, which ignores indigenous systems, such as South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation process. They ask why the Court does not actively investigate alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Iraq, Afghanistan or Gaza. So far, however, the Court — which has no dedicated police mechanism — has not secured a single conviction of African defendants.
The Court has indicated that it may encourage signatory states to detain Bashir in international air space. Some senior lawyers have argued that this could violate international law, if Bashir were hi-jacked. Thus could air piracy compound Washington’s difficulties with piracy at sea.
Washington has long declared its opposition to the ICC, arguing that it would be used to exact “political” justice, and that states and individuals would be pursued for bogus political reasons under the façade of justice. Paradoxically, the American position on Sudan and the ICC has proved this to be absolutely the case. While attacking the ICC in the strongest terms, Washington nevertheless acquiesced in the Security Council referral of Darfur to the ICC (while demanding immunity for its own citizens). Washington has urged Sudan to submit to ICC demands. To many observers this is precisely the sort of political vendetta the U.S. had itself warned that the Court might be used for.
Peace Before Justice?
The ICC acted in order to improve conditions in Darfur. Instead they have been made worse. The timing of the arrest warrants could not have been more unpropitious. Just before March, peace talks in Doha were moving towards a possibly favourable outcome. The various rebels groups in Darfur are now encouraged to stall on talks. And Khartoum’s knee-jerk response of ejecting major humanitarian agencies, alleging that they spied on behalf of the ICC, will also exacerbate the suffering of the hundreds of thousands of refugees.
Bashir’s advisors make the point that the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement which ended the longest war in Africa’s biggest country — the north-south conflict — did not include specific judicial claims to punish the numerous war crimes on both sides. The 2005 agreement, an unsung triumph of the Bush administration, could itself now be disrupted. That is why the former southern rebels, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, now a part of the National Unity government in Sudan, fret about a possible return to war because of ICC intervention.
The ICC wants peace, but threatens to undermine it throughout Sudan. In a glaring example of the law of unintended consequences, the ICC action has made Bashir a poster-boy for the Sudanese nation. He will probably easily win the presidential election early next year. With the exception of the rebels in Darfur, many Sudanese — both opponents and allies — are likely to rally around him. Another unintended consequence is that, like Mugabe, fear of the ICC will make Bashir president for life. He cannot risk retiring, even if he wanted to, 20 after coming to power in a coup. No one expected the ICC to entrench dictatorships.
The Future
Sudan is often projected as a tough authoritarian “Islamo-fascist” state. It is certainly authoritarian, but also potentially fragile. If the destabilisation of the peace process in the West (Darfur) and in the South leads to further explosions in the unsettled East, then a replay of the meltdown in Somalia could result. Sudan has borders with nine states, including Egypt, a strategic partner of the US. The implosion of Sudan would mean its removal as a key ally in Washington’s counter-terrorism campaign. Surely President Obama has enough failed or failing states to worry about?
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Justice is for all| 5.29.09 @ 8:09AM
International Law don't just apply to some people, what about Israel.
After weeks of controversy, false starts, and wavering club support, The Holocaust Industry author Professor Norman Finkelstein spoke before a crowd of over 100 in the Rappaporte Treasure Hall Tuesday. His three-hour lecture discussed Israel's human rights record, alleged exaggeration of the Holocaust to exonerate Israeli policies, as well as touching upon his long-time feud with Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz.
"Dissent is tied to justice, justice tied to dignity," said Harvard Professor Sarah Roy, who introduced Finkelstein. "Today, there is a war against dissent… our right to oppose has been stigmatized and devalued." She also claimed that Finkelstein cut through "the artificial web of complexity" surrounding the Middle East Conflict.
"I'm being cast as a martyr these last few weeks," said Finkelstein of his recent battles at DePaul to earn tenure. "Two thousand years ago, another Jew tried that with mixed results." Describing former President Jimmy Carter's controversial book Palestine Peace, Not Apartheid, Finkelstein said that "the actual content of the book… was remarkably uncontroversial… one might even call it tepid." Instead, Finkelstein said, "what's most striking is how uncontroversial this is, yet there is so much controversy when you bring it into a public forum."
He added that the complexity of the Middle East conflict "is contrived, is fabricated, is conjured up." Stating the World Court's 2004 14-1 decision for Israel to return to its 1967 borders, Finkelstein said "it's illegal to obtain territory through war… ‘disputed territories?' Not so, says the World Court… it's illegal under international law."
Because of this, Finkelstein said, Carter's book was far from controversial: "He is merely rendering the opinion of the highest international court in the world, the World Court." He claimed that while other decisions were several thousand pages, the decision regarding Israel was less than 100 pages "because it was so uncontroversial."
Finkelstein also touched upon Israel's security wall: "If Israel is building the wall to incorporate the settlements, then the wall is clearly illegal under international law."
Also, he claimed that according to historian Benny Morris' research, "what happened in 1948 was an ethnic cleansing" of Palestinians from the disputed territories, citing one author's claim that "the ethnic cleansing was anchored in the Zionist philosophy of transfer..." Indeed, Finkelstein said, "according to Morris, the biggest mistake they made was they didn't expel every single last Palestinian in 1947, because then this would never have happened today."
Finkelstein also heavily criticized Israel's human rights record, saying that "Israeli terrorism is four times as legal," and "for not wanting to kill Palestinian children, Israel [is] pretty good at it."
He did say, however, that it was "a no-brainer" for Palestinians to cease suicide bombings and terrorist attacks on Israel: "It's illegal, and Hamas is duty-bound under international law to renounce terrorism." However, he said, "one of the cornerstones of international law is reciprocity—what's good for the goose is good for the gander."
Finkelstein told the audience that "everyone in this room knows the solution… the two-state solution. Every year they vote on it, and every year, the votes are the same… the main obstacle for progress is for Israel… to remove from occupied territories" and "recognize a Palestinian state…with East Jerusalem as its capital." He cited Ha'aretz, which claimed that Israel "we enthusiastically chose to become a colonialist society."
Finkelstein also stated "the second fake controversy is playing ‘the Holocaust card'…if you can claim that Jews have suffered uniquely, you do not have to hold them to a universal standard." He said "every time Israel comes under international pressure to solve the Israeli-Palestinian problem diplomatically…there is a new claim of a ‘new' anti-Semitism."
United Nation of Nothing| 5.29.09 @ 10:48AM
RACE AND THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION By Danny Glover
The Nation April 8, 2009
In 2001 I traveled to Durban, South Africa, to join the tens of thousands of people who came to participate in the United Nations-sponsored World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance. More than 2,000 came from the United States, a rainbow of people crossing all lines--racial, ethnic, national, language, immigration status, religious and much more--joining an equally diverse crowd from across the globe. It was an extraordinary opportunity to meet, discuss, argue and strategize over how to rid the world of these longstanding evils.
Our participation paralleled that of the official US delegation. And that's where we faced a huge challenge. The Bush administration team, having only grudgingly agreed to participate at all, made clear they had no real commitment to fighting racism or offering leadership on other challenging issues of discrimination. When they didn't like a few small parts of the sixty-one-page text, they packed up and walked out of the conference. It was a sad but hardly surprising moment, exposing once again the history of US failures to take seriously the consequences of its own legacy of racism, a point most recently made by Attorney General Eric Holder.
Alan Brooks| 5.29.09 @ 4:12PM
who, or what, are you? Daphne?
too bad you and your cohorts can't be treated as poorly as Jews have been-- you might even learn something, you radical shill.
Learn your HISTORY| 5.31.09 @ 4:18PM
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Lehman Brothers Admits Past Ties to Slavery
by Cheryl Corley
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Real Media|Windows MediaExplain these links
Morning Edition, December 11, 2003 · Global investment firm Lehman Brothers files an affidavit confirming that, in the 1850s, it profited from the slave trade. The company made the admission so it could continue to do business with the city of Chicago. The revelation provides evidence for slave descendants suing corporations for compensation. Hear NPR's Cheryl Corley.
Lelani J | 6.5.11 @ 9:08AM
Well, I agree completely with Gavin, the attitude is total contemptUTI Treatment