Alfred de Zayas, a UN Independent Expert for the promotion of an international democratic and equitable order, told Venezuela’s newspaper Últimas Noticias that “it is time” for Venezuela to ask the International Criminal Court “for an investigation into the crimes against humanity committed by the United States for imposing sanctions against it.”
Why do you consider sanctions as crimes against humanity?
TEMA, GHANA (Analysis) — The Argentine naval vessel Libertad embarked on its maiden voyage in 1961 and remains, to this day, a maritime and mechanical marvel. At 340 feet, it is one of the longest, heaviest, and yet fastest ships afloat — holding, at one time or another, several world speed records. With its classical windjammer design and clipper bow, it is the ninth naval vessel in Argentina to bear the name “Libertad” and is adorned with a wood-carved figurehead clothed in long, flowing robes to represent the idea of liberty.
THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (Opinion) — The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Fatou Bensouda, recently announced that a “preliminary investigation” would be launched into the sovereign state of Venezuela, citing alleged incidents of state violence committed during the months of street protests in 2017. These violent protests claimed the lives of over 100 people from direct violence, violence related to looting, road blockades that prevented ambulances from reaching hospitals, as well as instances of adventurism.
When reality goes off the chart of what is thinkable, fiction is no match. That Oxford University’s most iconic living graduate Aung San Suu Kyi may find herself at the International Criminal Court for her “complicity of silence in crimes against humanity” and even a genocide will go down in history as one such extraordinary tale. Yet as the UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar, Yanghee Lee made unequivocally clear in her 6-
(COMMONDREAMS) — International Criminal Court (ICC) judges are weighing over one million statements from Afghans who allege they are victims of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by actors in the armed conflict there, including Afghan forces, the Taliban, the CIA, and the U.S. military. The victims began submitting their statements to the ICC judges in late November […]
For the first time in its history, an interrogator from Israel’s secret police agency, the Shin Bet, is to face a criminal investigation over allegations of torture.
It will be the first probe of the Shin Bet since Israel’s supreme court issued a landmark ruling nearly two decades ago prohibiting, except in extraordinary circumstances, the use of what it termed “special methods” of interrogation.
Before the ruling, physical abuse of Palestinians had been routine and resulted in several deaths in custody.
“The Balkans” – this notion that signifies more a state of mind than geographic location, usually derisively associated with powder kegs, ancient hatreds and “Asiatic” primitivism “in the heart of Europe” – has long ceased to occupy the headline pole position of the Clinton era. Used since the 1990s mostly as code for the violent dissolution of former Yugoslavia and the various spillover effects regionally and beyond – the term and its theme have been since displaced by waves of other real (and some imaginary) news, only occasionally to briefly flash back through mainstream Western media.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has said that there is a “reasonable basis” to believe that British soldiers committed war crimes during their campaign in Iraq. In its report on the “Preliminary Examination Activities 2017”, delivered in New York to an assembly of countries, the Chief Prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, declared that her office was going to push ahead in gathering evidence to see if a formal investigation is to be launched against the UK at The Hague.
On November 18, just days before the 50th anniversary of United Nations Resolution 242, the US State Department took its first step towards severing its ties with the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO).
The timing of this decision could not be any more profound.
Theatre, hysterics, denunciations. No tight, orderly and sterile space could ever entirely contain those dark characters with lengthy butcher’s bills and blood soaked attributes. Screams accompanied accusations; words to make all blush were shouted at witnesses, lawyers and judges.
