JULY 17, 1998
THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT IS ESTABLISHED:
A VICTORY OF THE TRANSNATIONAL RADICAL PARTY
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The idea for an International Criminal Court to judge particularly serious crimes which are unpunished is almost one hundred years old. The most brutal war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocides have not found - with the exception of the Nuremberg and Tokyo Tribunals - the juridical instruments or system that would ensure their punishment.

Affirming the "right to interfere"

Since 1989, with the transformation of the international political situation and the affirmation of the "right to interfere" - invented by Radicals during the global war against hunger in the early 80s, the procedures to establish an International Criminal Court have been furthered by the French Government and by an initiative of the government of Trinidad and Tobago.The mass crimes committed during the war against Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, and the controversy that arose over extraditions from Libya, resulted in numerous countries assuming a favourable position in 1992 for the creation of such an international court. Consequently, the United Nations gave the responsibility of elaborating a statute for an International Criminal Court to the "International Law Commission."

The first success: the institution of the Tribunal for crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia

In 1993, thanks to an international mobilization sponsored by a handful of organizations - including the TRP, which gathered signatures from tens of thousands of parliamentarians, intellectuals and citizens of the world and consigned them .to the Secretary of the United Nations - a court was established to investigate and prosecute crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia, thus heralding the first fundamental step toward the affirmation of international jurisdiction The birth of the campaign for a permanent International Court. In face of these important events, the TRP launched, in 1993, a campaign calling for a conference for the establishment of a permanent International Criminal Court. In 1994, a number of initiatives took place in the European Parliament and national parliaments, as well as initiatives aimed at governments; various resolutions were supported by hundreds of European mayors, by parliamentarians and celebrities; the TRP, together with Muhamed Kresevljakovic, Mayor of Sarajevo and Radical, promoted a march in Rome under the banner "No Peace Without Justice," in which tens of thousands of European citizens and representatives of cities participated. Emma Bonino, then Secretary of the Transnational Radical Party, was asked to represent the Italian Government at the United Nations on the question of the International Court, and she volunteered Italy to host the Conference, urgently relaunching the call for the International Court with a demand for precise dates. Noting these events, the 49th UN General Assembly, in November of that same year, created a Preparatory Committee for the elaboration of the court’s draft statute.The Preparatory Committee closed its last work session on 30 August, 1996 with a recommendation to the UN General Assembly setting 1998 for the convocation of the Diplomatic Conference of Plenipotentiaries for the establishment of the International Criminal Court. In October 1996, on the initiative of TRP deputies, the European Parliament approved consistent budgets within its ordinary budget, for the Ad Hoc Tribunals against crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, as well as for the as yet unestablished permanent International Criminal Court. The Transnational Radical Party and the "No Peace Without Justice" Committee - an NGO created in 1994 for the promotion of international campaigns supporting the expedient establishment of the International Criminal Court, following the conclusions drawn by the Preparatory Committee - began work on a series of initiatives and the collection of signatures from parliamentarians of the world. In an appeal published in The International Herald Tribune and in Le Monde, dozens of prominent political figures and more than 700 parliamentarians asked that the UN General Assembly renew, during its 1996 session, the mandate of the Preparatory Committee and that it confirm the convocation of the Conference to establish the International Criminal Court in 1998. In 1997 there was an explosion of initiatives that resulted in the approval of new parliamentary resolutions; the organization of prestigious conferences in Paris, Malta, New York, Atlanta, Montevideo, Rome and Brussels, and the publication in various newspapers of a new appeal to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in favour of the establishment, by 1998, of the permanent court. These collective initiatives brought, in December of 1997, the confirmation of the convocation of the Diplomatic Conference in Rome in June, 1998.The campaign has not ended. Obstacles remain, primarily the role of the UN Security Council, the independence of the International Criminal Court and its officials, and the question of financing. The front formed by States in favour of the Court must be consolidated. In this respect, the Dakar Conference scheduled for February, and which will gather the majority of African nations with the goal of reaching a common position for the court's realization and its operative efficiency, is all-important.

1994, Emma Bonino and the UN Secretary-General Bhoutros Bhoutros Ghalli

1996, Muhamed Kresevljakovic, mayor of Sarajevo, during the Press Conference hold on the TRP Headquarters

1998, Emma Bonino, European Commissioner, meet Kofi Anan UN Secretary-General

(Updated January 1998)

Appeal of parliamentarians all over the world for the establishment of the International Court

Proposal of a parliamentary motion

International Criminal Court Conference

Documents, news and initiatives (Italian, English)