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POLITICS: U.S. Opposes Global Court’s Protection for U.N. Workers

Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 25 2003 (IPS) - The United States is holding up a proposed U.N. Security Council resolution that calls all future attacks on U.N. humanitarian workers ”war crimes”, subject to jurisdiction by the recently created International Criminal Court (ICC).

The draft resolution, which urges all 191 member states to adopt new laws ensuring the safety of U.N. workers, is supported by the other 14 members of the Security Council.

Sponsored by Mexico, and co-sponsored by Bulgaria, France, Germany, Russia and Syria, the resolution was to have been adopted Monday.

But it has now been temporarily shelved because Washington has sought a postponement of the vote apparently to exert pressure on Council members.

According to one published report, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell has asked Mexico to delete references linking attacks on U.N. workers to jurisdiction under the ICC.

State Department spokesman Philip Reeker told reporters Monday that while Washington appreciates the need to protect U.N. humanitarian workers, ”we have concerns about some of the language, particularly references to the International Criminal Court”.

The United States has strongly opposed the ICC, which came into force in March, because it fears its troops and senior officials could be hauled before the court in politically motivated prosecutions for alleged crimes committed in military conflicts.

The court was set up to investigate and prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide in cases where countries with direct ties to the crimes are not able or willing to prosecute themselves.

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton signed the Rome Statute that created the ICC but the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush later renounced the move. That means, for example, that U.S. soldiers and officials involved in the attack on Iraq last March are not liable for prosecution of ”war crimes”.

”Regardless of the Bush administration’s ideological opposition to the ICC, the Rome Statute properly treats serious crimes against humanitarian workers as war crimes,” Bill Pace of the Coalition for the ICC, said Monday.

The statute provides both added deterrence and protection to those taking tremendous risks to secure peace, such as the U.N. personnel who were killed in the Baghdad car bomb attack last week, he added.

”The U.S. opposition to the new resolution protecting humanitarian workers is unacceptable,” said David Donat-Cattin of the international law programme at Parliamentarians for Global Action, “especially considering the gravity of last week’s war crimes against the United Nations in Baghdad”.

A suicide car bombing on the U.N. compound last week killed 24 people, including several senior U.N. officials in charge of the Iraqi humanitarian programme.

”After the tragic killing of aid workers in Baghdad, the U.S. opposition to the proposed resolution is disgraceful,” added Richard Dicker, director of the international justice programme at Human Rights Watch (HRW).

In a statement, he said the Bush administration should not let its ill-conceived and ideologically driven crusade against the ICC compromise efforts to protect humanitarian aid workers.

The contested passage merely states that attacks against humanitarian personnel and peacekeepers are a war crime under the Rome Statute, he added.

The proposed Security Council resolution supporting the safety of aid workers should be immediately placed before the body for a vote and adopted without delay, said Decker.

In recent months, the Bush administration has continued to undermine the authority of the ICC through several Security Council resolutions, including one last month exempting U.N. peacekeepers from the court’s jurisdiction.

It also cut off military aid to 35 states that supported the court and refused to exempt U.S. soldiers from the ICC’s jurisdiction for alleged acts committed on their soil. Washington says it has also signed agreements with 51 countries that have promised to not turn over U.S. soldiers or officials to the court.

Early this month, U.S. officials successfully included a paragraph in a Security Council resolution that authorised a peacekeeping force for Liberia, providing immunity for peacekeepers serving in that country.

”This provision undercut the International Criminal Court treaty and other important aspects of international law. Security Council members were then forced to choose between deploying peacekeepers to Liberia and upholding established principles of law,” HRW said at the time.