International Criminal Justice & post conflict / Comment
The Difficulties of the International Criminal Justice in Darfur
07/03/2006 By Amaya Úbeda de Torres
Darfur is a complex conflict, in which multiple factors intervene, and the final solution to stop violence is still being sought.
In this context, the United Nations Security Council has decided, in 2005, to analyse the facts before the International Criminal Court (ICC), which entails a series of important difficulties.
In fact, currently, and given the harshness of the existing clashes in the region, the Court is developing a research process mainly out of the country, which jeopardises the objectivity and efficacy of a task that is complicated in itself due to the large number of victims and the difficult access to conflict areas.
In addition, the ICC faces the essential challenge of proving its capacity to judge and punish those found guilty of the serious crimes committed, assuring its independence from the Security Council.
However, the obstacles to the Court's task come not only from the conflict itself, but partially from great state reluctance. The government, by establishing special national courts, intends to exclude the intervention of the ICC by virtue of the principles of complementarity and subsidiarity.
Darfur will be an acid test for the International Court to assert its role in the pacification of an internal armed conflict, despite the limits entailed by the international criminal justice itself.
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Keywords
Conflict Human rights International Criminal Court SudanBio author: Amaya Úbeda de Torres
BA in Law from the University Complutense of Madrid, Diploma of Advanced Studies in International Law from the University Robert Schuman (Strasbourg) and Diploma of Advanced Studies in European Studies from the Ortega and Gasset Institute.
Researcher at the University Complutense of Madrid (UCM) and Lecturer at the Centre of International Humanitarian Law Studies and Diffusion (Centro de Estudios y Difusión del Derecho Internacional Humanitario, CEDIH) of the Spanish Red Cross.
