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August 1, 2013

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Crime of Aggression, ICTR, ICTY, International Criminal Court, Rome Statute, UN Charter

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Superior Orders under the Rome Statute: a Flawed Development

Individual criminal responsibility for the violation of the provisions of International Humanitarian Law is the matter of International Criminal Law. The latter, in turn, envisages different forms of responsibility for the crimes committed as well as certain grounds upon which one may be relieved of the aforementioned responsibility. Article 33 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court deals with individual responsibility in cases of superior orders or the prescription of law and states that:

1.         The fact that a crime within the jurisdiction of the Court has been committed by a person pursuant to an order of a Government or of a superior, whether military or civilian, shall not relieve that person of criminal responsibility unless:

(a)     The person was under a legal obligation to obey orders of the Government or the superior in question;

(b)     The person did not know that the order was unlawful; and

(c)     The order was not manifestly unlawful.

2.         For the purposes of this article, orders to commit genocide or crimes against humanity are manifestly unlawful.[1]

Several interesting issues should be pointed in respect to this. First, in order to relieve one of individual criminal responsibility under Article 33 its conditions (a), (b) and (c) have to be met cumulatively. Moreover, Article 33 won’t be of much help when committing a crime of genocide or a crime against humanity pursuant to an order of the government or a superior. Thus, given that the Rome Statute currently envisages only three crimes which fall under the jurisdiction of the Court (genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity), meeting the aforementioned criteria cumulatively arguably relieves a person of criminal responsibility only for the committal of war crimes.

One should bear in mind that this provision of the Rome Statute is different from those of the Charter of the International Military Tribunal (the Nuremberg Tribunal), the Charter of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the Charter of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda which provided for individual criminal responsibility of subordinates notwithstanding the circumstances. The decision of the ICTY on the case of Dražen Erdemović is notable in this regard. On the 16 of July 1995 Dražen Erdemović, a soldier of the 10th Sabotage Detachment, and others received an order to execute 1000-1200 men and boys who had surrendered to the members of the Bosnian Serb police or army near Srebrenica. Erdemović allegedly resisted the order, but was then told that he either shot them, or hand his gun to another, and join those to be killed. Erdemović followed the order and performed the execution. He was brought before the ICTY and found guilty notwithstanding the circumstances since the ICTY Charter did not contain provisions on the relief of criminal responsibility.[2] This was fortunately fixed in the Rome Statute, yet, one might argue that the latter has its own flaws.

Since the provisions of Resolution RC/Res.6[3] adopted at the Kampala Conference and amending the Rome Statute do not affect Article 33, one can reasonably argue that meeting its three criteria cumulatively also relieves one of criminal responsibility for the committal of the crime of aggression. The definition of the crime of aggression is set in Article 8 bis (1) of the Rome Statute:

For the purpose of this Statute, “crime of aggression” means the planning, preparation, initiation or execution, by a person in a position effectively to exercise control over or to direct the political or military action of a State, of an act of aggression which, by its character, gravity and scale, constitutes a manifest violation of the Charter of the United Nations.

To narrow it down a bit in order for there to be a crime of aggression there has to be an act of aggression which constitutes a manifest violation of the UN Charter. Bearing in mind that the three criteria have to be met cumulatively a person is relieved of criminal responsibility only if the order of a superior or the government is not manifestly unlawful. If these two statements are put together, the following question arises: can an order to perform an act constituting a manifest violation of the UN Charter be not manifestly unlawful? I doubt it.

Moreover, as argued by P. Gaeta, “if the performance of an order by a superior implies the commission of a war crime, the order cannot but be considered manifestly unlawful, given the very serious nature of the conduct prohibited by the international rules on such crimes. The illegality of an order which constitutes a grave breach of the 1949 Geneva Convention (such as the order to kill, torture or threat inhumanely persons protected by the Conventions) is obvious.”[4]

Therefore, the provision of Article 33(1)(c) of the Rome Statute read in conjunction with Article 33(2) is arguably futile since it can hardly be applied to any crime at all, however, in the absence of any judicial practices in this respect it is hard to tell whether the ICC will unconditionally decline the challenges raised under it. Moreover, currently the Court primarily focuses on superiors and given that it operates in a highly charged political atmosphere and still has to assert itself within the international community the application of Article 33(1)(c) is not likely to happen within the near future.

Written by Jan Guardian

[1]       UN General Assembly, Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (last amended 2010), 17 July 1998, ISBN No. 92-9227-227-6, Article 33 [online][accessed 31 July 2013].

[2]       Prosecutor v. Dražen Erdemović (Sentencing Judgement), IT-96-22-Tbis, International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), 5 March 1998 [online][accessed 31 July 2013].

[3]       Kampala Review Conference, Resolution RC/Res. 6, 13th Plenary Meeting, June 11, 2010, I.C.C. Doc. RC/Res. 6 [online][accessed 31 July 2013].

[4]       Paola Gaeta, The Defence of Superior Orders, 10 EJIL 172 (1999), p. 185 [online][accessed 31 July 2013].

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July 31, 2013

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Human Rights, Sentencing

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Undertrials :Sentenced without Conviction

Written by Garima Tiwari

Undertrial

“The laxity with which we throw citizens into prison reflects our lack of appreciation for the tribulation of incarceration; the callousness with which we leave them there reflects our lack of deference for humanity.”[i]    -Supreme Court of India (2013)

The Supreme Court in the above case granted bail to Thana Singh who had been languishing in an Indian prison for more than 12 years, awaiting the commencement of his trial for an offence under the narcotics law.

An undertrial, or a pre-trial detainee denotes an un-convicted prisoner i.e. one who has been detained in prison during the period of investigation, inquiry or trial for the offence she/he is accused to have committed. He is an accused who is assumed to be innocent till proven guilty. He is in custody only to ensure that he appears at court as required or is available to answer questions during investigations. There is no other reason for him to be in prison Undertrials constitute 64.7% of the total prison population in India. There are over 2.41 lakh undertrial prisoners in India.[ii] An extensive investigation across the country has exposed a dark sub-culture thriving in jails across the country, not very different from the murky underworld of organised gangs and criminals. In the absence of proper legal aid, the poor and the vulnerable, especially women and youngsters, unwittingly become part of the sordid system.[iii]

Many prisoners are constrained to languish in prisons because the police do not finish investigation and file the charge-sheet in time. This is a very serious matter because such people remain in prisons without any inkling of a police case against them. Many prisoners remain in prisons for long period because of the delay in trial.

              The grant of bail[iv] is one important remedy available to reduce pre-trial detention. [v] Indian courts have reiterated that the grant of bail should be the rule rather than the exception. Because they are considered to be less likely to abscond or interfere with the investigation, bail provisions in non-bailable offences are more liberal if the accused is under sixteen, a woman, sick or infirm.[vi] Despite sounding fair, the bail provisions and their implementation are highly discriminatory. But the prisoners are unable to serve surety and as has been mentioned in the Legal Aid Committee appointed by the Government of Gujarat noted[vii]:

The bail system causes discrimination against the poor since the poor would not be able to furnish bail on account of their poverty while the wealthier persons otherwise similarly situated would be able to secure their freedom because they can afford to furnish bail.

As the UN Human Rights Committee (UNHRC) noted, pretrial detention can therefore negatively impact the presumption of innocence,[viii] and should be used only as a “last resort.”[ix] States should only detain individuals pending trial where it is absolutely necessary. International and regional human rights instruments are explicit as to the limited circumstances under which pretrial detention is permissible. The UNHRC has stated that,

“bail should be granted, except in situations where the likelihood exists that the accused would abscond or destroy evidence, influence witnesses or flee from the jurisdiction of the state party.”[x]

In criminal proceedings, following the first appearance before a judicial officer, European Court of Human Rights Article 5(1) only permits detention when it is reasonably necessary to prevent further offenses or flight.[xi] Thus, international standards strongly encourage the imposition of noncustodial measures during investigation and trial and at sentencing, and hold that deprivation of liberty should be imposed only when non-custodial measures would not suffice.

Most of those in the Indian prisons are poor, indigent, illiterate or semi-literate. They do not know that they are entitled to free legal aid or that they can be released on personal bond. They therefore, continue to be in jail for long periods. Lack of adequate legal aid and a general lack of awareness about rights of arrestees are principal reasons for the continued detention of individuals accused of bailable offences, where bail is a matter of right and where an order of detention is supposed to be an aberration. [xii]

The overuse of detention is often a symptom of a dysfunctional criminal justice system that may lack protection for the rights of criminal defendants and the institutional capacity to impose, implement, and monitor non-custodial measures and sanctions. It is also often a cause of human rights violations and societal problems associated with an overtaxed detention system. One of the fundamental elements of human rights law which importance grew over time is the concept of “Fair Trial”. Taking this into account, the question rises how far the application of the fair trial rights stretches into the pre trial stage of investigation. Answering this question is far from easy and as Safferling points out correctly, it is by no means obvious what the fair trial concept really encompasses and what the singular rights within this concept really stand for.[xiii]

In India, apart from the Prisoners Act, 1984, there is a Model Prison Manual in place and the various judicial pronouncements have made it clear that prisoners are entitled to human rights, the most important of which is presumption of innocence till proven guilty.

In 1982-83, the All India Jail Reforms Committee under Justice A.N. Mulla came out with suggestions for prison reform. Yet to be implemented, the committee had recommended that undertrial prisoners should be lodged in separate facilities, away from convicted prisoners. It had also called for quick trials, simplification of bail procedures and suggested that bail should be granted to the accused as a matter of right unless the prosecution could prove that releasing the accused on bail endangered the security of society.[xiv]  Another suggestions is that it should be made mandatory for the jail authorities to educate them about their rights and provide them legal aid. The plight of the wrongfully confined prisoners is compounded when jail authorities refuse to release information about them in public domain. One very relevant solution is Section 436A of the Indian Criminal Procedure Code states that the maximum period for which an undertrial prisoner can be detained without being released is not more than 50% of the maximum imprisonment specified for the charge he/she is booked for, except if the offence attracts death as the maximum punishment. According to the law, such prisoners can be released on personal bond if they cannot furnish bail. This provision is hardly used by authorities. Public-spirited citizens and lawyers could also take up these matters. The prison authorities should display the updated information every month on their website and also display hard copies of the information in every prison in a place where prisoners have access.

As Justice P.N Bhagwati, “It is high time that the public conscience is awakened and the government as well as the judiciary begins to realise that in the dark cells of our prisons there are a large number of men and women who are waiting patiently, impatiently perhaps, but in vain, for justice – a commodity which is tragically beyond their reach and grasp.”[xv]

 

[i] Thana Singh v. Narcotics Bureau of Narcotics (23 January, 201)

[ii] National Crime Recorts Bureau Data 2012 (India)

[iv] The Indian Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 does not define the term “bail” although offences are classified as bailable and non-bailable.

[v] The main bail and bonds provisions are provided in Chapter XXXIII of the Indian Criminal Procedure Code.

[vi] Handbook of Human Rights and Criminal Justice in India, by South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre, Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, 2007, p. 62.

[vii]Report of the Legal Aid Committee appointed by the Government of Gujarat, 1971 (headed by Justice P.N. Bhagwati) (p. 185)

[viii] Human Rights Committee, Concluding Observations: Argentina, CCPR/CO/70/ARG (2000), para. 10.

[ix] United Nations Minimum Rules of Non-Custodial Measures, Principle 6.1

[x]  Hill v. Spain, Communication No. 526/1993, para. 12.3.

[xi] Council of Europe, Recommendation (2006)13 on the Use of Remand in Custody, the Conditions in which it takes place and the Provision of Safeguards against Abuse, para. 6.

[xiii] SAFFERLING,CHRISTOPH J. Towards an International Criminal Procedure, Oxford 2001 p.26

[xv] Hussainara Khatoon and Others v. Home Secretary, State of Bihar AIR 1979 SC 1360.

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July 23, 2013

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International Criminal Court, Rome Statute, Sentencing

Sound Sentencing? Aggravating Factors in Lubanga

Written by: Regina Paulose

Hidden deep within the Rome Statute and the ICC Rules of Procedure of Evidence (RPE) are the sentencing guidelines for the ICC. These articles receive very little attention. This is most likely because there has been only one case which has reached the sentencing phase at the ICC. How the Chamber interprets aggravating factors and the challenges that lay ahead in the use of aggravating factors is the focus of my article this month. Continue reading →

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July 17, 2013

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Sentencing

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WHICH CRIME? WHICH PUNISHMENT?

On 16th July 2013, Ali Ahsan Mojaheed was convicted of genocide by the Bangladeshi War Crimes Tribunal. Mojaheed was charged with genocidal acts involving multiple crimes including the  kidnapping and murder of certain individuals during the 1971 independence war against Pakistan. He was thereafter sentenced to death. This conviction added to the growing number of convicted felons for genocide, variously described as ‘the crime of crimes’. One could say that Mojaheed is, in many ways, unlucky.

Slightly less than a month before that-on 20th June, 2013-Stanislas Mbanenande, an ethnic Hutu from Rwanda, was also convicted of genocide. However the sentencing tribunal was different-a Swedish court. In convicting and holding him responsible for several massacres in Kibuye region, the court stated thus: “It has been proved that the purpose of the acts of which the defendant has now been convicted was to wholly or partly destroy the Tutsi ethnic group. The acts have therefore been assessed as genocide”[1]. The court then proceeded to sentence him to a life in prison. Mbanenande was, in some ways, unlucky.

Gaspard Kanyarukiga, who had earlier been convicted of genocide and extermination as a crime against humanity over the same Rwanda genocide, was only sentenced 30 years by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). A slap in the wrist.

However, Mbanenande is lucky in many ways. He still has his life about him. Secondly, although he will likely spend a long time in prison, he will live in relative comfort-compared to the sordid conditions in the jails in Bangladesh for those unlucky enough to be convicted by the War Crimes Tribunal. Thirdly, it is likely that his sentence could be commuted for good behavior.  In fact he would definitely thank his gods if he were to read about the fate of Ali Ahsan Mojaheed Mr Mbanenande surely is lucky.

These disparate sentences for the same offence reveal the “absence of an articulated ICL philosophy of or justification for punishment and the dearth of sentencing principles”[2]. In reality, it is difficult to discern what the purpose of the sentences is, especially at the international arena. Whereas, admittedly, there has been an attempt to ensure internal consistency in the sentences within the international bodies, there is still a huge disparity between the sentences imposed by different tribunals. Again, there is a failure to take into account the maximum sentences to be imposed by domestic jurisdictions on the similar offences. A man who rapes a 12 year old girl in Kenya, for example, will be sentenced to a mandatory life sentence. However, the Kenyans being tried at the ICC for mass rapes-among other offences-will, if convicted, likely not be sentenced for more than 40 years. Charles Taylor’s sentence by the Special Court for Sierra Leone for “aiding and abetting, as well as planning, some of the most heinous and brutal crimes recorded in human history” resulted in a prison sentence of 50 years, notwithstanding the prominent role he played as a former head of state. Less for more!

The paradoxical argument one could make from such a scenario would be that if one is so inclined to commit certain crimes then s/he should do it in such a grave manner that it would attract the attention of the international community. It is better, it seems, to commit mass murder and to be tried by the International Criminal Court, than to kill an individual and be liable for capital punishment within the domestic jurisdictions.

In addition, it is important for international criminal law to develop its own theories for sentencing of offenders. If the sentences imposed are a reflection of the determination “to put an end to impunity for the perpetrators of these crimes and thus to contribute to the prevention of such crimes”[3] then we need to seek why this is not being realized. Why do we always seem to have a Libya or a Syria after every Cote d’Ivoire or Kenyan experience?  Isn’t this an indication of the failure of the sentences to act as a prohibition for future offences. If, on the other hand, it is a process of expressing our (the international community’s) indignation at the actions of the perpetrators then surely more indignation ought to be captured at the international level. An understanding of what the intention of the sentences is at the international level is the only way to remove the present absurd realities that encourage “forum shopping”.

[2] Robert D. Sloane, The Expressive Capacity Of International Punishment: The Limits Of The National Law Analogy And The Potential Of International Criminal Law, 43 STAN. J. INT’L L. 39 (2007)

[3] Preamble to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court

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June 30, 2013

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Organized Crime

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Transnational Organized Crime in the Commonwealth of Independent States: a Brief Characterization

Official statistics on Transnational Organized Crime (hereinafter – TOC) in the Commonwealth of Independent States (hereinafter – CIS) does not exist. According to some experts, more than 300 organized groups and criminal organizations in the CIS have international connections, i.e. accomplices, divisions or isolated groups in other states.[1] Most of these connections, however, are limited to the CIS countries themselves.

This phenomenon is conditioned by the nature of the respective types of TOC, with the following being the most dangerous in the CIS:

  • Terrorism;
  • Drug trafficking;
  • Trafficking in weapons and ammo;
  • Smuggling of alcohol, oil, gas and securities;
  • Smuggling of motor vehicles;
  • Laundering;
  • Counterfeiting.

TOC in the CIS does not differ that much from the TOC throughout the world, except for it has its own arguably unique features:

  • A fairly successful infiltration into the highest governmental bodies;
  • Intense association as to both effectively counter criminal prosecution and to crowd out the leading criminal structures from their markets in Europe and in the United States;
  • Focus on long-term export of illicit assets outside the CIS;
  • Frequent resort to assassinations and extortion as a means of redistribution of influence;
  • Focus on securing transport routes for drug trafficking from the Asian and Caucasian regions to the Western Europe;
  • A critically high number of criminal associations having strong connections with corrupt authorities including police, local governmental authorities and their bodies;
  • Centralization on the Moscow region as a financial bridge between criminal organizations of the CIS and the rest of the world.[2]

The development of TOC in recent decades might be considered as a process of rational reorganization of criminal enterprises on the international plane analogous to that of legal enterprises in the economic market. Besides, national and international criminal organizations’ structures are very similar to those of big corporations: both have labor division aimed at extracting maximal profits and ensuring minimal risks. TOC entities in the CIS, however, did not appear spontaneously: they were growing in numbers in proportion to the growth of political and social instability caused by rapid and erroneous changes in the economy and politics.

CIS criminals act coordinately in single criminal zones of their countries. The growth trend of TOC which is common to many countries around the world will be common to the CIS at least for a couple of decades. One can hardly believe that TOC entities will not exploit such favorable conditions as the simplified procedure for crossing the border, the establishment of free economic zones, the weakness of the legal framework governing the fight against TOC and inadequate border and customs control.

The development of international relations simultaneous to the increase of crime entails the growth of the criminal environment activities on establishing new transnational connections and the growth of the number of transnational crimes, with one of the indicators that proves such merging of criminal entities across the CIS being human trafficking.

Studies on TOC in the CIS show that there are peculiarities in the geography of criminal activities: Central Asia is favorable for drug trafficking, the Far East – for smuggling cars and extortion.

Current practices suggest that the main features of TOC entities in the CIS are:

  • Regular acquisitions of goods in countries where some members of a criminal group reside and their subsequent export to countries of other criminal members where the goods are in a higher demand;
  • The presence of mixed organized groups whose primary focus is smuggling and illegal export of large quantities of goods;
  • A large network of goods marketing operating under single leadership;
  • A network of currency exchange for illicit financial assets;
  • Export channels for illicit assets.[3]

Written by Jan Guardian

[1]     Bekryashev A., Belozyorov I., Shadow Economy and Economic Crime. Moscow: Open Society Institute (2000), chapter 3 [online][accessed: June 26, 2013].

[2]     Erkenov S., Transnational Crime: State and Transformation, Bilenchuk P. (ed.) K: Atika (1999), chapter 1 [online][accessed: June 26, 2013].

[3]     Gevorgyan G., State of transnational organized crime in the CIS, “Black Holes” in Russian Legislation 1 (2003), p. 276 [online][accessed: June 26, 2013].