Terrorism and the International Criminal Court

The Netherlands proposed for the inclusion of the crime of terrorism in the Rome…

“… [T]errorist acts, by whomever and wherever perpetrated and whatever their forms, methods or motives, are serious crimes of concern to the international community. We have all committed ourselves to cooperate fully in the fight against terrorism, in accordance with our obligations under international law, in order to find, deny safe haven and bring to justice, on the basis of the principle of extradite or prosecute, any person who supports, facilitates, participates or attempts to participate in the financing, planning, preparation or perpetration of terrorist acts or provides safe havens. Yet, at the same time, there is all too often impunity for acts of terrorism in cases where states appear unwilling or unable to investigate and prosecute such crimes. Impunity for such serious crimes calls for a role for the International Criminal Court. After all, the Court has been established to prosecute the most serious crimes of concern to the international community. In 1998, the Rome Conference adopted Resolution E, which specifically regards terrorist acts as such. In Resolution E, regret is expressed that no generally acceptable definition of the crime of terrorism could be agreed upon for the inclusion within the jurisdiction of the Court. Unfortunately, this is still the case today. While we must therefore further increase our efforts to overcome this lack of agreement, we should at the same time start moving towards preparing the provisional inclusion of the crime of terrorism within the jurisdiction of the Court. In this respect, the upcoming Review Conference provides for an important momentum. Resolution E indeed recommends that a Review Conference considers, inter alia, the crime of terrorism, with a view to arriving at an acceptable definition and its inclusion in the list of crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court.”(68)…