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Asia as a region remains significantly under-represented at the International Criminal Court.  Until recently, Asia was represented by two judges at the ICC, namely Judge Song Sang-Hyun from South Korea and Judge Fumiko Saiga from Japan.  Sadly, Judge Saiga passed away on 24 April 2009 and an election will be held in November 2009 to fill the vacancy caused by her death.  On 11 March 2009, Judge Song was elected as the new President of the ICC.

 

The judges of the ICC reflect gender and geographical diversity.  Of the 16 existing judges of the ICC, seven are men and nine are women.  Six come from Western Europe, four come from Africa, three from Latin America and the Caribbean, two from Eastern Europe and one from Asia.  They sit in three divisions, namely the Pre-Trial, Trial and Appeals divisions.   

The ICC is assisted by a Prosecutor (currently Luis Moreno-Ocampo of Argentina), a Deputy Prosecutor (currently Fatou Bensouda of The Gambia) and a Registrar (currently Silvana Arbia of Italy).   

In addition, the Registry of the ICC maintains a list of 282 counsel (226 men and 56 women) who are eligible to act for the defence and for victims.  They come from 49 different countries, and include one from Malaysia, Datuk N. Sivananthan.  Applications are open and there are opportunities for more Malaysians with criminal law experience to be admitted to the list of counsel.   

Although Malaysia participated in the United Nations Diplomatic Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Establishment of an ICC and signed the Final Act, it did not proceed to sign the Rome Statute and is currently not a member of the ICC.  In its latest comment on the issue of accession to the Rome Statute, contained in the 3 June 2009 addendum to the Report of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of Malaysia, the Malaysian Government stated: 

Presently, Malaysia is not considering accession to the Rome Statute of the ICC.  Nevertheless, the Government continues to observe and assess the implementation and operationalisation of both the Rome Statute and the ICC.  Malaysia does not preclude the possibility of cooperation with the ICC, however such cooperation can only occur once the domestic legal framework is strengthened so as to enable the prosecution of crimes under the jurisdiction of ICC, whether committed in the country or abroad.

 

Indeed, there has been a perceptible hardening of Malaysia’s position since its earlier comment contained in its National Report prepared in early November 2008 for the UPR session in Geneva in February 2009.  This could be explained by the fact that in late November 2008 the office of the Prosecutor of the ICC issued an indictment against the sitting President of Sudan, Omar Hassan Ahmad Al Bashir, for crimes against humanity in relation to the situation in Darfur.  This has aroused the ire of many Third World countries, but most especially from the members of the African Union and the Organisation of the Islamic Conference. 

13 July 2009

To commemorate International Justice Day, which marks the anniversary of the adoption of the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court, the Bar Council’s Human Rights Committee (HRC) is planning a debate that will take place at the Bar Council auditorium at 7.00 p.m. this Wednesday, 15 July 2009.

Everyone is cordially invited to attend this event, which is open to the public. Please click here for further details.