THE HAGUE: Worldwide Felony Courtroom (ICC) Prosecutor Karim Khan has defended his resolution to convey struggle crimes allegations towards Israel’s prime minister, saying Israel had made “no actual effort” to analyze the allegations itself.
In an interview with Reuters, he stood by his resolution over the arrest warrant regardless of a vote final week by america Home of Representatives to sanction the ICC in protest, a transfer he described as “undesirable and unwelcome”.
ICC judges issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, former Israeli defence chief Yoav Gallant and Hamas chief Ibrahim Al-Masri final November for alleged struggle crimes and crimes towards humanity through the Gaza battle.
The Israeli prime minister’s workplace didn’t instantly reply to a request for touch upon Khan’s remarks to Reuters.
Israel has rejected the jurisdiction of the Hague-based court docket and denies struggle crimes. The US, Israel’s predominant ally, can also be not a member of the ICC and Washington has criticised the arrest warrants towards Netanyahu and Gallant.
“We’re right here as a court docket of final resort and … as we converse proper now, we have not seen any actual effort by the State of Israel to take motion that might meet the established jurisprudence, which is investigations relating to the identical suspects for a similar conduct,” Khan informed Reuters.
“That may change and I hope it does,” he mentioned in Thursday (Jan 16)’s interview, a day after Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas reached a deal for a ceasefire in Gaza.
An Israeli investigation may have led to the case being handed again to Israeli courts beneath so-called complementary ideas. Israel can nonetheless display its willingness to analyze, even after warrants had been issued, he mentioned.
The ICC, with 125 member states, is the world’s everlasting court docket to prosecute people for alleged struggle crimes, crimes towards humanity, genocide and aggression.
Khan mentioned that Israel had superb authorized experience.
However he mentioned “the query is have these judges, have these prosecutors, have these authorized devices been used to correctly scrutinise the allegations that we have seen within the occupied Palestinian territories, within the State of Palestine? And I feel the reply to that was ‘no'”.
