Might the U.S. Finally Join World Criminal Court?

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http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docID=weeklyreport-000003093495


From the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals to the tribunals that brought to account perpetrators of ethnic cleansing in the Balkans and Rwanda, the United States has been in the vanguard of modern international criminal justice efforts — with one important exception: In the seven years since 60 countries — now 108 members including most of Europe, South America and Japan — created the International Criminal Court to prosecute human rights violations, the United States has steadfastly refused to join. The Bush administration opposed the court’s efforts, on the grounds the tribunal would interfere with national sovereignty and could seek to imprison U.S. soldiers or civilian federal officials on spurious charges trumped up to combat unpopular American actions.

Now, with a new administration in place that appears friendlier to the role of international institutions in U.S. affairs, backers of the court are making a push for renewed consideration. Last month, the American Society of International Law, a group of 4,000 leading lawyers, judges and academics, issued a report saying the United States should drop its hostility toward the court and begin to explore ways to support the tribunal. Among the report’s authors were Sandra Day O’Connor, the former Supreme Court justice; Patricia M.Wald, a former chief judge of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals and a member of the Yugoslavia tribunal; and William H. Taft IV, a deputy Defense secretary in the Reagan administration and the State Department’s top lawyer during George W. Bush ’s first term.

Backers of the international court were heartened last month when Congress, in assembling the omnibus spending package for the rest of this fiscal year, jettisoned language that during the past four fiscal years had conditioned U.S. economic aid on countries’ promises not to try and prosecute American officials in the court.

And in the wake of the court’s indictment last month of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, for war crimes and crimes against humanity for the killings in the Darfur region, the Obama administration has signaled it may at least consider membership.
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