International Criminal Court Seeks UN Help To Deal With 'Defiant' Sudan

April 23, 2010
RTT News
Original Source: 
http://www.rttnews.com/Content/GeneralNews.aspx?Id=1278751&SM=1

The Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) has sought the help of United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to get the Sudan to co-operate with its tribunal dealing with incidents of ethnic-cleansing in that East African land-locked country's troubled Darfur region.

In a formal request to ICC judges, a copy of which was made available Thursday, Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo sought to issue a finding of non-compliance against the Sudanese government for its failure to execute arrest warrants against two war crime suspects, Ahmad Harun and Ali Kushayb, sent out by the ICC prosecutor in 2007.

"The purpose of this filing is to notify the Chamber of continued lack of cooperation by the Government of the Sudan ... and to seek a finding from the Chamber pursuant to Article 87 of the Rome Statute to be transmitted to the United Nations Security Council," the request of April 19 said. 

Haroun who served in the Sudan's council of ministers appointed by President Omar Hassan Ahmad al-Bashir is said to have financed government-backed Janjaweed militia. It is accused of having conducted widespread attacks on black Sudanese including the use of rape as a 'Weapon of Terror' in Darfur. And, Kushayb is charged with ordering killings, rapes and arson in Darfur in 2003 and 2004.

Rather ironically, Haroun was given overall charge of refugee camps set up to accommodate non-combatants forced to flee as a result of the attacks carried out on his orders and this was pointed out by Moreno-Ocampo in the letter.

Legal experts meanwhile said the move by ICC prosecutors to get its judges to issue a warrant of non-compliance was unprecedented. They added that under the ICC's Rome statute, Khartoum was bound to support and co-operate with the tribunal.

The Sudan also has the dubious distinction of having Bashir become the first ever head of state to be declared an 'ICC fugitive.'