Matching the release of a new report to a major speech, the International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor on Monday condemned the United States and appeased China.
Serving since 2012, Fatou Bensouda will leave office next year.
But in her speech, Bensouda again made clear that she is no fan of America. Lamenting what she described as Washington’s “aggressive policy of antagonism,” Bensouda warned that U.S. sanctions against her represent “a dangerous precedent for a rule-based international system.” Bensouda’s complaint pertains to Trump administration sanction responses to her politically motivated investigation of American soldiers and intelligence officers in Afghanistan. Ignoring the U.S. Military and Intelligence Community’s own investigations of alleged war crimes by U.S. personnel, Bensouda sidestepped the court’s tradition of only investigating alleged crimes in which a state actor is unwilling or unable to act.
Bensouda extends kinder privilege to Beijing. In her simultaneous release of a report on possible new investigations, Bensouda gave China a pass. She rejected an evidence docket evincing the forced expulsion of Uighur Muslims from Cambodia and Tajikistan to China. That evidence would have allowed Bensouda to start an investigation against China for its ethnocidal conduct toward the Uighur people even though China is not a court member. The precedent is clear. As the Lawfare blog noted in July, “The court may exercise jurisdiction over international crimes when part of the criminal conduct takes place on the territory of a signatory.” Ironically, it was Bensouda herself who has set precedent here!
Lawfare explains. “In 2018, the prosecutor of the ICC, Fatou Bensouda, submitted a request to exercise jurisdiction over the alleged deportation of the Rohingya people from Myanmar to Bangladesh. She argued that although the coercion to deport members of the Rohingya people occurred in Myanmar (which is not a party to the [court governing] Statute), the action of the crossing the border technically occurred in Bangladesh (which is a party to the Statute). Because the border-crossing was an element of the forcible transfer and deportation crime, [the court] agreed with Bensouda and decided that the case would fall within [its] jurisdiction.”
Bensouda, absurdly, has now abandoned one of her own legacy actions. In a ridiculous opinion, Bensouda used case law from Bosnia to claim that the evidence of forced deportations to China was not sufficiently indicative of forced deportations. Put another way, Bensouda said that she doesn’t care too much about a few million Muslims living under tyranny.
The chief prosecutor says she’s open to receiving more evidence in the future, but it’s obvious what’s going on here. Bensouda is happy to attack America, but she’s not so willing to upset China. And some on the Left wonder why conservatives are so skeptical of international organizations?
