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Home Archive for category "International Tribunals" (Page 2)

Part I: What can be done about the length of proceedings at the ICC?

Published on November 15, 2019        Author:  and

 

Editor’s note: this is Part I of a two-part post.

“Judgement does not come suddenly; the proceedings gradually merge into the judgement.”

Franz Kafka, The Trial

Jean-Pierre Bemba made his first appearance before the Pre-Trial Chamber in July 2008. His trial began in November 2010 and lasted four years. Two more years passed before the Trial Chamber found him guilty in March 2016. Another two years passed before the Appeals Chamber finally acquitted him in June 2018. He had been in custody for almost a decade. Other trials at the ICC have lasted nearly as long.

Long proceedings are not unique to the ICC. The most striking case must be the Nyiramasuhuko et al trial at the ICTR. There were six accused, arrested between 1995 and 1998. The trial began in June 2001. All six were convicted ten years later, in June 2011. Their appeals were not resolved until December 2015, by which time one of them had been in detention, awaiting the final resolution of proceedings, for twenty years.

The problem of lengthy criminal proceedings plagues domestic judicial systems, too. Indeed, a significant number of applications before the European Court of Human Rights (“ECtHR”) concern alleged violation of the right to a fair trial within a reasonable time under article 6 of the European Convention of Human Rights (“ECHR”). The extent of the problem in certain countries has prompted the ECtHR to resort to the so-called ‘pilot judgment’ procedure.

What is a reasonable length for criminal proceedings? Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: EJIL Analysis, European Court of Human Rights, Human Rights, International Criminal Court, International Criminal Law, International Tribunals
 
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The European Court of Human Rights and Workplace Surveillance: Where is Article 31(3)(c) VCLT?

Published on November 14, 2019        Author: 

 

Although one may be familiar with criticisms of the EU’s self-contained approach to its own legal system, this case of fragmentation is not limited to the EU alone. In fact, in one of the more recent cases on the docket of the European Court of Human Right (ECtHR), it was the Court’s Grand Chamber that adopted a self-contained attitude towards the interpretation of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). It did so by failing to account for EU rules concerning workplace surveillance which were relevant for the interpretation of the ECHR.

In López Ribalda and Others v. Spain (Applications nos. 1874/13 and 8567/13) (the Decision), a Spanish employer installed hidden CCTV cameras as part of an investigation into ‘inconsistencies between the stock level and the sales figures’ (§12 of the Decision). The employees were not informed about the existence of such cameras (§13 of the Decision). Subsequently, some of them were filmed while stealing (or while they were aiding other people who were stealing goods from the supermarket) and were dismissed (§§14-16 of the Decision). The dismissals were challenged in the Spanish courts as the evidence used for this was obtained through an act (covert video surveillance) which (allegedly) breached the applicants’ right to protection of privacy. However the Spanish courts rejected these claims. It was considered that the employer acted in a proportionate manner, as the measures were necessary, were limited in time and were focused on the supermarket’s checkout counters (§§19-39 of the Decision). Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: European Court of Human Rights, Human Rights
 
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Of Babies, Bathwater, and List B Judges at the International Criminal Court

Published on November 13, 2019        Author: 

 

The Open Society Justice Initiative recently released an excellent report on the selection of judges at the International Criminal Court (“Raising the Bar”). It is a detailed and thoughtful report combining often eye-opening interviews and desk scholarship. It makes a number of very important recommendations about improving the process by which ICC judges are nominated and elected. In this post, however, I wish to take issue with one of the report’s key recommendations. It is only one recommendation, but it is an idea which is increasingly frequently put forward in various fora as a sine qua non of effective International Criminal Court reform.

This is the suggestion that the only criterion for appointment to the ICC judiciary should be excellence in the practice of criminal law. Thus, the suggestion goes, the statutory provision that judges may be elected either on the basis of expertise in criminal law and practice (the “List A” judges) or expertise in relevant areas of international law and practice (the “List B” judges) should be abolished.

The Open Society Justice Initiative report certainly lends significant credence to the view that the List B route to the ICC bench has on occasion been used to appoint lawyers who have spent their career as diplomats and not prosecutors, defenders, judges, or scholar-practitioners.

However, the idea that a significant number of the Court’s woes would be corrected if only it were properly staffed with solid criminal law judges is, I think, overstated. Let’s briefly consider a few of the decisions of the Court which have been most maligned in recent commentary. Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: EJIL Analysis, International Criminal Court, International Criminal Law, International Legal Profession, International Tribunals
 
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Provisional Measures in Ukraine v. Russia: From Illusions to Reality or a Prejudgment in Disguise?

Published on November 8, 2019        Author: 

 

On 19 April 2017, the ICJ rendered an Order dealing with Ukraine’s request for provisional measures concerning the alleged violations by Russian Federation of both the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism (‘ICSFT’) and International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (‘CERD’).

In assessing the request for provisional measures, the Court moved from requiring plausibility of rights to requiring of plausibility of claims. The latter constitutes a higher threshold compared to the former eloquently described by Judge Abraham in his separate opinion appended to the Pulp Mills judgment and consistently followed by the ICJ as discussed below.

This new test requires the Court, at the provisional measures stage, to consider aspects of the merits, which relates to the probability of the claim’s success, and goes beyond a pure jurisdictional analysis. This post examines the limits of Court’s assessment of the merits of a dispute in the context of a request for provisional measures, in the light of the binding nature of such measures and the need for balance between prejudgment and the protection of adjudication’s consensual nature. Does a requirement of factual plausibility disturbingly blur the distinction between merits and incidental proceedings? Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: EJIL Analysis, International Court of Justice, International Tribunals
 
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An Arusha-based World Court on Human Rights for African States?

Published on November 7, 2019        Author: 

 

The Arusha-based African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACtHPR) enjoys a distinctively broad contentious jurisdiction extending to ‘all cases and disputes submitted to it concerning the interpretation and application of the Charter, this Protocol and any other relevant Human Rights instrument ratified by the States concerned’ (Article 3(1) of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR)). The ACtHPR’s striking feature sets it apart also from most international courts. One may even argue that, as far as African States are concerned, the ACtHPR functions as a world court on human rights by consolidating human rights obligations of State parties under the auspices of a single judicial body on a regional level. In this post I will offer a few, brief thoughts on some of the legal issues pertaining to the material jurisdiction of the ACtHPR. For a detailed analysis of these matters see my recent article in the Human Rights Law Review.

The ACtHPR’s approach

The ACtHPR has proved itself willing to exercise its material jurisdiction to the fullest possible extent. It systematically applies, and finds violations of, other human rights treaties, including regional, sub-regional and UN treaties, and it orders the respondent States to comply with their respective obligations. Some scenarios on how applicants submit complaints are:

  1. bringing a case claiming a violation of a right which is not protected under the ACHPR but is protected by another treaty ratified by the State concerned;
  2. alleging a breach of a right which, although included in the ACHPR, is formulated in another treaty in a manner that ensures a higher level of protection (see, Lohé Issa Konaté);
  3. claiming a violation of a human right which is protected in the same way under both the ACHPR and another treaty, but no mechanism is envisaged or is available to the applicant under that other treaty to bring an individual complaint (see Tanganyika Law Society);
  4. choosing to bring a complaint before the ACtHPR (instead of, or in addition to, another international body) as a litigation strategy (e.g., physical proximity to a forum, litigation costs, avoidance of stricter admissibility criteria before UN human rights bodies).

New designs and old anxieties Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights, Human Rights
 
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The Other Poisoned Chalice: Unprecedented Evidentiary Standards in the Gbagbo case? (Part 3)

Published on November 6, 2019        Author: 

In this three-part series I seek to draw attention to legally-unprecedented and epistemologically-unsound evidentiary standards emerging at the ICC, particularly in the Gbagbo case.  The mainstream reaction to the Gbagbo case has been to accept the narrative that the problem lies entirely with evidence.  However, when the majority derides the “questionable quality of much of the evidence” (§1608), it speaks from a lens of Cartesian standards. If one reads the judgment instead through the lens of more typical legal standards, the evidence is harrowing.  Thousands of diverse items of evidence – eye-witnesses, videos, insiders, experts, and forensic and documentary evidence – attest to hundreds of instances of killing, wounding, raping, torturing and burning of civilians by police and other pro-Gbagbo forces.

At Nuremberg, Robert Jackson warned that giving the defendants an unfair trial would be a poisoned chalice for the tribunal itself.  My concern is that opposite extreme is also a poisoned chalice.  An exclusive focus on the interests of the accused, to the exclusion of all other considerations, leading to rarified and ungrounded standards, will also collapse the system.  If unchecked, these standards can only lead to repeated collapses of investigations and prosecutions.  We are at an interesting moment, because scholars are rightly warning against ‘crisis narratives’, and I myself have appealed for less alarmism.   Nonetheless I think that evidentiary standards are now one of the most crucial topics for study and reform.

The previous two posts (see Part I here and Part II here) gave only a cursory outline of problematic approaches to evidence and examples thereof. I will now touch on two related points, (1) evidentiary expectations for crimes against humanity and (2) investigative criticisms that overlook the applicable legal regime, and then I will conclude. Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: Crimes Against Humanity, EJIL Analysis, Genocide, International Criminal Court
 
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The Other Poisoned Chalice: Unprecedented Evidentiary Standards in the Gbagbo Case? (Part 2)

Published on November 6, 2019        Author: 

My aim in this three-part series is to start a conversation about unusual and problematic evidentiary standards emerging at the ICC.  These standards flow from a commendable impulse to uphold the highest standards, but they entail an unprecedented and unattainable exactitude. In my view, if these standards take hold, they will result in the repeated crashing of complex cases, making them especially poorly suited for precisely the types of cases the ICC is mandated to deal with. 

In my view, the more common and appropriate approach, seen in national and international practice, is even-handed, holistic, experiential and practical.  The experiential approach draws on human experience.  It employs sound methods of reasoning, such as triangulation, extrapolation, interpolation, and inference to best explanation, and thus it is can work judiciously with patterns and inferences.  It is also practical: it bears in mind feasibility and procedural economy.

For brevity, I will call the alternative, emerging approach the “Cartesian” approach. I introduced its features in part 1 of this series, such as its hyperscepticality, atomism, and fixation with certainty and speculative doubts.  In this post I will give some additional examples of problematic evidentiary approaches as seen in the Gbagbo trial decision.  As the judgments are over 1300 pages, I am only able to outline some of the concerns and some examples in the most general and cursory.  My hope is to trigger an invigorated discussion of international criminal evidence law.

Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: Crimes Against Humanity, International Criminal Court, International Criminal Law
 
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The Other Poisoned Chalice: Unprecedented Evidentiary Standards in the Gbagbo Case? (Part 1)

Published on November 5, 2019        Author: 

The aim of this post is to start a conversation about unusual evidentiary standards emerging in some judgments at the ICC.  Although the underlying impetus is commendable, these standards pose legally unprecedented and epistemologically unsound demands.  Remarkably, these novel evidentiary approaches, which depart significantly from national and international practice, have not yet triggered much conversation.  As recent cases (such as Gbagbo) have ended in acquittals, the Court-watching community has largely simply echoed the judicial criticisms of the evidence, and hence blamed inadequate investigations.  While investigative improvements are likely part of the solution, any serious effort to repair the ICC has to consider these evidentiary standards.  These standards will significantly increase the costs and delays of ICC proceedings.  In cases of any complexity, the standards can only result in failed cases.  An invigorated sub-discipline – international criminal evidence law – is urgently needed.

In this three-part series of posts, I will focus on the Gbagbo acquittal judgment.  Douglas Guilfoyle’s thoughtful ‘tale of two cases’ advances a hypothesis that the different outcome between the Gbagbo acquittal and Ntaganda conviction is because the latter focused on an easier, smaller case.  That may be true, but I want to place alongside that another hypothesis, that the difference between the two outcomes may in part be the very different approaches by the judges.

I open with a word of sympathy for judges.  At an earlier stage of international criminal law, Tribunal judges were often criticized by academics (including me) for adopting approaches that were too pro-conviction and that overlooked rights of the accused.  Hence it is entirely understandable that judges and legal officers may have lurched in the other direction, with an eagerness to demonstrate their unparalleled care for the accused. 

The problem is when the zeal for impeccable standards swings too far, and produces a method that is so rigid, formalistic, and hypersceptical that it loses sight of substance and feasibility. Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: Crimes Against Humanity, International Criminal Court, International Criminal Law
 
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The International Court of Justice Releases New Rules of Court

Published on November 4, 2019        Author: 

On 21 October 2019 the International Court of Justice released a series of amendments to its Rules of Court. This is the first substantive change to the Rules since 2005 and marks the fifth time the Rules have been amended since the creation of the Court (discounting the PCIJ years, on which more will be said in a moment).

The 2019 amendments are of interest because they come at a time when practical and academic interest in the Court’s procedure is at an all-time high. I say this not only because it is the focus of my own PhD research. Questions of International Law hosted a conference on procedure in May of this year; the International Law Association Committee on the Procedure of International Courts and Tribunals is in its final year and will be reporting in 2020; and the Max Planck Institute released last month a new encyclopedia dedicated to matters of procedure.

This post will set out a brief history of the Court’s Rules, speculate on the driving forces behind the 2019 amendments, and consider the implications of the new Article 79 on preliminary matters. Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: EJIL Analysis, International Court of Justice
 
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Case Closed, but what about the Execution of the Judgment? The closure of Anchugov and Gladkov v. Russia

Published on October 30, 2019        Author:  and

 

 

In the beginning of October, EJIL: Talk! published a series of posts (here and here) by George Stafford, one of the co-directors of the European Implementation Network, who raised alarm about the status of execution of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (the ECtHR). Based on the available statistical data, George argued that the problem of non-execution is “far more widespread than many believe.” Our post continues to address the important issue of the execution of judgments of the ECtHR by focusing on a specific case, namely Anchugov and Gladkov v. Russia – a 2013 judgment concerning the disenfranchisement of prisoners in Russia. 

On September 25th, the Committee of Ministers (the CM) of the Council of Europe, which pursuant to Article 46(2) of the European Convention on Human Rights (the ECHR or the Convention) supervises the execution of judgments of the ECtHR, adopted a final resolution CM/ResDH(2019)240, which closed the supervision of Anchugov and Gladkov v. Russia. The closure of the case means that Russia has complied with Anchugov and Gladkov judgment, as per assessment of the CM.

Anchugov and Gladkov became a test case for the Russian Constitutional Court (the RCC) under the domestic mechanism introduced in 2015, which permitted the Russian authorities to refuse the execution of judgments of the ECtHR on the basis of the RCC’s assessment of non-compliance of such judgments with the Russian Constitution. The RCC’s 2016 ruling of 19 April 2016 finding that the execution of Anchugov and Gladkov judgment was “(im)possible” provoked strong criticism from legal scholars and became a symbol of Russia’s resistance to the authority of the ECtHR. Read the rest of this entry…

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Filed under: Deprivation of Liberty, EJIL Analysis, European Convention on Human Rights, European Court of Human Rights, Human Rights
 
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