The crime of genocide under international law

International Criminal Law Review

Volumn 6, Issue 4, 2006, Pages 461-502

  Kreß, Claus ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF COLOGNE   (Germany)

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EID: 36549062645     PISSN: 1567536X     EISSN: 15718123     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1163/157181206778992287     Document Type: Article

References (137)

1. Prosecutor v. Kambanda, Judgment and Sentence, ICTR-97-23-S, 4 September 1998, para. 16.
2. Subsequently, the ICTR Appeals Chamber denied the existence of a hierarchy of crimes in Prosecutor v. Kayishema and Ruzindana, Judgment (Reasons), ICTR-95-1-A, June 2001, para. 367.
3. Prosecutor v. Krstic, Judgment, IT-98-33-A, 19 April 2004 [hereafter Kristic Appeal], para. 36.
4. Thomas Franck in his oral pleading before the ICJ in the Case concerning the Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro), CR 2006/5, 1 March 2006.
5. Report of the International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur to the Secretary-General. Pursuant to Security Council resolution 1564(2004) of 18 September 2004, Annex to U. N. Doc. S/2005/60, 1 February 2005 (hereafter: Darfur Report).
6. For a similar view, see Peter Quayle, The Legislative Limitations of the Genocide Convention, 5 International Criminal Law Review (2005), 364 et seq.
7. For similar a word of caution, see Freda Kabatsi, Defining or Diverting Genocide: Changing the Comportment of Genocide, 5 International Criminal Law Review (2005), 399.
8. Judgment of the International Military Tribunal for the Trial of German Major War Criminals, Nuremberg 30th September and 1st October 1946, London, Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1946, p. 13.
9. Prosecutor v. Tadic, Decision on the defence motion for interlocutory appeal on jurisdiction, IT-94-1-AR72, 2 October 1995, para. 97.
10. Prosecutor v. Akayesu, ICTR-96.4. T, Judgment, 2 September 1998, para. 469.
11. U. N. Doc. A/96 (I), 11 December 1946.
12. See also German Bundesgerichtshof, Judgment of 30 April 1999, 45
13. Amtliche Sammlung der Entscheidungen des Bundesgerichtshofs in Strafsachen (2000), p. 81.
14. Cf. the title Code of Crimes against Peace and Security of Mankind chosen by the ILC for its important 1996 draft (Yearbook of the International Law Commission 1996 II 2, p. 386) and see the prominent reference to "peace and security of the world" in the third preambular consideration of the ICC Statute (while not ignoring the somewhat lofty additional reference to the "well-being").
15. Nehemiah Robinson, The Genocide Convention. A Commentary (New York: Institute of Jewish Affaires, 1960), p. 58.
16. Claus Kreß, § 220a/§ 6 VStGB, in: Wolfgang Joecks/Klaus Mierbach, eds., Münchener Kommentar zum Strafgesetzbuch. Band 3 (München: Verlag C. H. Beck, 2003), p. 639.
17. On Genocide, in: Richard Falk/Gabriel Kolko/Robert Jay, eds., Crimes of War (New York: Randam House, 1971), p. 534.
18. see, on the one hand, Vahakn N. Dadrian, Genocide as a Problem of National and International Law: The World War I Armenian Case and Its Contemporary Legal Ramifications, 14 The Yale Journal of International Law (1989) 221;
19. Taner Akcan, Armenien und der Völkermord (Hamburg: Hamburger Eidition, 2004), passim;
20. but see, on the other hand, the controversial recent study by Guenter Lewy, The Armenian Massacres in Ottoman Turkey. A Disputed Genocide (Salt Lake City: The University of Utah Press, 2005), p. 250 et seq.
21. Quoted after Leo Kuper, Genocide. Its political use in the Twentieth Century (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), p. 12.
22. United Nations War Crimes Commission, ed., History of the United Nations War Crimes Commission and the Development of the Laws of War (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1948), p. 35.
23. In particular, the Nuremberg Indictment used the term in this context; for a more detailed account, see United Nations War Crimes Commission, supra n. 23, p. 148;
24. cf. also Trial of Hauptsturmführer Goeth, Supreme National Tribunal of Poland, 7 LRTWC (1948), 7;
25. U. S. v. Greifelt, 13 LRTWC (1949), 1.
26. These deliberations are exhaustively documented in the important Summary Records of the meetings of the Sixth Committee of the General Assembly, U. N. GAOR, 6th Committee, 3th session, 1948.
27. 78 UNTS, p. 277.
28. Study on the question of the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, UN. Doc. E/CN.4/Sub.2/416, 4 July 1973.
29. Revised and updated report on the question of the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, UN. Doc. E/CN.4/Sub.2/1985/6, 2 July 1985.
30. ICC-ASP/1/3.
31. For a very interesting reference to the possible role of general principles in the genesis of the criminalization under general international law, see Payam Akhavan, The Crime of Genocide in the ICTR Jurisprudence, 3 Journal of International Criminal Justice (2005), p. 990 et seq.
32. Reservations to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Advisory Opinion of 28 May 1951, ICJ Reports 1951, p. 23.
33. Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Bosnia-Herzegovina v. Yugoslavia), Preliminary Objections, Judgment of 11 July 1996, ICJ Reports 1996 (II), p. 616.
34. see generally Jan Wouters/Sten Verhoeven, The Prohibition of Genocide as a Norm of Ius Cogens and Its Implications for the Enforcement of the Law of Genocide, 5 International Criminal Law Review (2005), 401 et seq.
35. On the use of the concepts of "unilateral" and "reciprocal or bilateral" speciality in the ICTY case law, see recently Fulvio Maria Palombina, Should Genocide Subsume Crimes Against Humanity?, 3 Journal of International Criminal Justice (2005), 780.
36. In Prosecutor v. Kunarac et al, IT-96-23&IT-96-23/1-A, 12 June 2002, para. 98, the ICTY Appeals Chamber held that "[t]here was nothing in the Statute or in customary international law at the time of the alleged acts which required proof of the existence of a policy or plan to commit these crimes." One can only note with the greatest measure of astonishment that such an extremely far-reaching judicial statement has not been supported by the most careful and complete legal reasoning in the text of the judgment itself but simply by a list of texts and cases put together in a footnote without any further explanation. It is submitted that the future case law in international criminal law should not attribute undue authority to such unreasoned judicial pronouncements.
37. For such view, see Alicia Gil Gil, Die Tatbestände der Verbrechen gegen die Menschlichkeit und des Völkermordes im Römischen Statut des Internationalen Strafgerichtshofs, 112 Zeitschrift für die gesamte Strafrechtswissenschaft (2000), p. 396 s. with references to the controversy in Spain in footnote 65.
38. see Prosecutor v. Musema, ICTR-96-13-A, Judgment, 16 November 2001, para. 366;
39. Krstic Appeals, supra n. 4, para. 227;
40. for the contrary view, see Prosecutor v. Krstic, Judgment, IT-98-33-T, 2 August 2001
41. [hereafter: Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment], para. 686.
42. The best study of the problem this author has come across is Carl Friedrich Stuckenberg, Multiplicity of Offences: Concursus Delictorum, in: Horst Fischer/Claus Kreß/Sascha Rolf Lüder, eds., International and National Prosecution of Crimes Under International Law (Berlin: Berlin Verlag Arno Spitz GmbH, 2001), p. 559 et seq.
43. Cf. in this context Legality of the Threat or Use of Nuclear Weapons, Advisory Opinion of 8 July 1996, ICJ Reports 1996, p. 14;
44. Case Concerning Legality of Use of Force (Yugoslavia v. Belgium), Request for the Indication of Provisional Measures, ICJ Order of 2 June 1999, para. 40;
45. for an important recent statement in line with the quotation from Lemkin and the following text, see William Schabas, Darfur and the 'Odious Scourge': The Commission of Inquiry's Findings on Genocide, 18 Leiden Journal of International Law (2005), 877;
46. Attorney-General of the Government of Israel v. Eichmann, District Court of Jerusalem, Judgment of 12 December 1961, 36 I. L. R. (1968), p. 79 et seq. [hereafter: Eichmann District Court Judgment].
47. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 549.
48. U. N. Doc. A/C.6/217, 5 October 1948.
49. Prosecutor v. Jelisic, Judgment, IT-95-10-T, 14 December 1999 [hereafter: Jelisic Trial Chamber Judgment], para. 100.
50. Cf. Neelanjan Maitra, A Perpetual Possibility? The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda's Recognition of the Genocide of 1994, 5 International Criminal Law Review (2005) p. 573.
51. This view appears to have been endorsed in the Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 584;
52. concurring Joe Verhoeven, Le crime de genocide. Originalité et ambiguité, 24 Révue Belge de Droit International (1994), p. 18;
53. Stefan Glaser, Droit International Pénal Conventionnel (Bruxelles: Établissements Émile Bruylant, 1970), p. 112;
54. for attempted genocide, however, Hans Vest, Genozid durch organisatorische Machtapparate (Baden-Baden: Nomos 2002), p. 115.
55. For a first statement to that effect and a summary of the pertinent case law, see Situation of the Democratic Republic of Congo in the Case of the Prosecutor v. Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, Decision concerning Pre-Trial Chamber I's Decision of 10 February 2006 and the Incorporation of Documents into the Record of the Case against Mr. Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, ICC-01/04-01/06, 24 February 2006, para. 50 et seq.
56. Claus Kress, The Darfur Report and Genocidal Intent, 3 Journal of International Criminal Justice (2005) 575.
57. For an interesting historic account in that context, see Orna Ben-Naftali/Yogev Tuval, Punishing International Crimes Committed by the Persecuted, 4 Journal of International Criminal Justice (2006) 128.
58. U. N. GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 664.
59. Prosecutor v. Jelisic, Judgment, IT-95-10-T, 14 December 1999, para. 70.
60. Prosecutor v. Stakic, Judgment, IT-97-24-A, 2 March 2006 [hereafter: Stakic Appeals Judgment], para. 20 et seq.
61. Brasil, U. N. GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 57;
62. Egypt, UN GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 99 et seq.;
63. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 556, using similar language as can be found in Schabas, supra n. 2, p. 112.
64. Anglo-Iranian Oil Co. Case, Judgment, Preliminary Objection, 22 July 1952, ICJ Reports 1952, p. 105.
65. concurring, in principle, Darfur Report, para. 494.
66. U. N. Doc. E/CN.4/Sub. 2/384/Rev. 1, para. 568.
67. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 559.
68. see Alicia Gil Gil, The Flaws of the Scilingo Judgment, 3 Journal of International Criminal Justice (2005), p. 1083 et seq.
69. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 559, alluding to the alternative to consider the Bosnian Muslims as a religious group.
70. Sarah Pritchard, der völkerrechtliche Minderheitenschutz (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2001), p. 39.
71. UN GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 115.
72. The similarity of the problem has been well expressed in the Darfur Report, supra n. 6, para. 498.
73. for the tribal groups under attack in Darfur, see Darfur Report, supra n. 6, para. 508.
74. Darfur Report, supra n. 6, para. 499.
75. Darfur Report, supra n. 6 para. 501.
76. See the explicit opposition voiced by Sweden, UN. GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, pp. 116.
77. Darfur Report, supra n. 6, para. 494.
78. Darfur Report, supra n. 6, para. 494;
79. Section 1093(6) U. S. Genocide Convention Implementation Act 1987;
80. Schweizer Botschaft über das Römer Statut des Internationalen Strafgerichtshofs, das Bundesgesetz über die Zusammenarbeit mit dem Internationalen Strafgerichtshof und eine Revision des Strafrechts of 15 November 2000, Bundesblatt der Schweizerischen Eidgenossenschaft 2000, p. 495.
81. United Kingdom, UN. GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 60;
82. Sovjet-Union, id., p. 105.
83. Norway, UN. GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 61.
84. the Darfur Report, supra n. 6, para. 133, "defines" a religious group as "sets of individuals having the same religion, as opposed to other groups adhering to a different religion".
85. repr. in: Sarah Joseph/Jenny Schultz/Melissa Castan, The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Cases, Materials, and Commentary (Oxford: Oxford UP, 2nd edition 2005), p. 502.
86. Darfur Report, supra n. 6, para. 491.
87. ICC Elements of Crimes, supra n. 32, Genocide by Killing, first element and footnote 2; on the case law of the ICTR, see most recently para. 6, footnote 2, of the Separate Opinion of Judge Shahabuddeen in Sylvestre Gacumbitsi v. Prosecutor, ICTR-2001-64-A, Judgment of 7 July 2006;
88. it is readily conceded to Karim A. A. Khan, Rodney Dixon and Adrian Fulford, eds., Archbold International Criminal Courts (London: Sweet & Maxwell, 2nd ed. 2005), 13-32, that the use of the plural "members of the group" tends to suggest otherwise. Such an interpretation, however, makes little sense and the subsequent practice has not followed it as is evidenced, most recently, by the wording of the ICC Elements of Crimes (supra n. 32).
89. Prosecutor v. Kayishema and Ruzindana, Judgment, ICTR-95-1-T, 21 May 1999, para. 109.
90. Prosecutor v. Kayishema and Ruzindana, Judgment, ICTR-95-1-T, 21 May 1999, para. 113, opines against any effort to construe the terms in the abstract and argues instead for an interpretation "on a case-by-case basis in light of the relevant jurisprudence".
91. Eichmann District Court Judgment, supra n. 47, p. 340.
92. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, paras. 510, 513;
93. cited with approval in Prosecutor v. Vidoje Blagojevic et al, IT-02-60-T, Judgment, 17 January 2005 [hereafter: Blagojevic Trial Chamber Judgment], para. 645.
94. Bundestags-Drucksache 2/162, p. 4.
95. Otto Triffterer, in Otto Triffterer, ed., StGB Kommentar. System und Praxis (Wien: Verlag Orac, lose-leaf: February 2001), Section 321, p. 34.
96. Guatemala. Memory of Silence, Report of the Commission of Historical Clarification. Conclusions and Recommendations, para. 116.
97. Prosecutor v. Stakic, Judgment, IT-97-24-T, 31 July 2003, para. 519;
98. referred to with approval in Krstic Appeal, supra n. 4, para. 33
99. and not challenged in Prosecutor v. Stakic, Judgment, IT-97-24-A, 2 March 2006, para. 46.
100. For such categorization, see Draft Convention of the Crime of Genocide, U. N. Doc. E/447, 1947, p. 6 et seq.
101. For such categorization, see the International Law Commission, UN. Doc. A/51/10, p. 91.
102. General Assembly UN. Doc. A/RES/44/25 (12 December 1989), Annex.
103. For the same view, see Roger S. Clark, The Mental Element in International Criminal Law: The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and the Elements of Offences, 12 Criminal Law Forum (2001), p. 324 et seq. (esp. the text in footnote 117).
104. Rissing-van Saan, The German Federal Supreme Court and the Prosecution of International Crimes Committed in the Former Yugoslavia, 3 International Criminal Justice (2005), p. 398 et seq;
105. the decisive passage is quoted in the form of an English translation in Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 579.
106. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 580.
107. Darfur Report, supra n. 6, paras. 515, 517, 518, 520.
108. Blagojevic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 105, para. 666.
109. ICJ, CR 2006/5, 1 March 2006, paras. 22 et seq (Thomas Franck).
110. U. N. GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 176 (proposal);
111. U. N. GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 122.
112. See the statements by the USA, Egypt and the United Kingdom in UN. GAOR, 3rd session, 6th Committee, p. 92;
113. concurring Alexander Greenawalt, Rethinking Genocidal Intent: The Case for a Knowledge-Based Interpretation (1999), 99 Columbia Law Review, p. 2290.
114. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 74.
115. Prosecutor v. Gacumbtsi, ICTR-2001-64-T, Judgment, 17 June 2004, para. 253;
116. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 597.
117. Stakic Trial Chamber judgment, supra n. 112, para. 523.
118. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 590.
119. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 595;
120. Prosecutor v. Rutaganda, ICTR-96-3-A, Judgment, 26 May 2003, para. 524;
121. German Bundesgerichtshof, Judgment of 21 February 2001, 54 Neue Juristische Wochenschrift (2001), p. 2733;
122. the Dutch Rechtbank's-Gravenhage, Judgment of 23 December 2005, sub 6.5.1 (an english translation of the judgment is available under http://zoeken. rechtspraak.nl/zoeken/dtluitspraak-print.asp?u-ljn=AX6406&u-hlquery=).
123. Darfur Report, supra n. 6, para. 491.
124. on the latter subject, see most recently - and in the context of the crime of genocide - Sylvestre Gacumbitsi v. Prosecutor, ICTR-2001-64-A, Judgment of 7 July 2006, Separate Opinion of Judge Shahabuddeen, paras. 28 et seq. vs. Separate Opinion of Judge Schomburg, paras. 14 et seq.
125. for a most recent confirmations see Sylvestre Gacumbitsi v. Prosecutor, ICTR-2001-64-A, Judgment of 7 July 2006, paras. 40 et seq.
126. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 571.
127. A very clear exposition of this view can be found in Hans Vest, 'Humanitätsverbrechen, Herausforderung für das Individualstrafrecht?', 113 Zeitschrift für die gesamte Strafrechtswissenschaft (2001), p. 486;
128. see also Harmen van der Wilt, Genocide, Complicity in Genocide and International v. Domestic Jurisdiction: Reflections on the van Anraat case, 4 Journal of International Criminal Justice (2006), 242.
129. Krstic Trial Chamber Judgment, supra n. 42, para. 597.
130. Alicia Gil Gil, Derecho penal internacional. Especial consideración del delito de genocidio (Madrid: Editorial Tecnos, 1999), p. 259 et seq.;
131. Hans Vest, Genozid durch organisatorische Machtapparate (Baden-Baden: Nomos 2002), p. 104;
132. for a recent doctrinal expression in favour of the purpose-based approach, see John D. Van der Vyver, The International Criminal Court and the Concept of Mens Rea in International Criminal Law, 12 University of Miami International and Comparative Law Review (2004), 85;
133. For a different view, see Hurst Hannum, International Law and Cambodian Genocide: The Sounds of Silence, 11 Human Rights Quarterly (1989), p. 107 et seq.;
134. England, Divisional Court, Queens Bench Division, Judgment, 3 July 1996, 111 International Law Reports, p. 584, 588.
135. For the opposite view, see Beth Van Schaack, The Crime of Political Genocide: Repairing the Genocide Convention's Blind Spot, 106 The Yale Law Journal (1997), 2259.
136. David J. Scheffer, The Future of Atrocity Law, 25 Suffolk Transnational Law Review (2002), 399 et seq.;
137. Andreas Hoyer, Internationaler Strafgerichtshof und nationalstaatliche Souveränität, 151 Goltdammer's Archiv (2004), 331 et seq.