Immunity For State Officials
On 14 February 2002 the International Court of Justice in the ICJ Arrest Warrant Case concluded that State officials may have immunity under international law while serving in office. The court stated that immunity was not granted to State officials for their own benefit, but instead to ensure the effective performance of their functions on behalf of their respective States. The court also stated that when abroad, State officials may enjoy immunity from arrest in another State on criminal charges, including charges of war crimes or crimes against humanity. But the ICJ qualified its conclusions, saying that State officers "may be subject to criminal proceedings before certain international criminal courts, where they have jurisdiction. Examples include the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda . . ., and the future International Criminal Court."
In 2003 Charles Taylor, the former president of Liberia, was served with an arrest warrant by the Special Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL) that was set up under the auspices of a treaty that binds only the United Nations and the Government of Sierra Leone. Taylor contested the Special Court's jurisdiction, claiming immunity, but the Special Court for Sierra Leone concluded in 2004 that "the sovereign equality of states does not prevent a Head of State from being prosecuted before an international criminal tribunal or court." The Special Court convicted Taylor in 2012 and sentenced him to fifty years' imprisonment, making him the first head of state since the Nuremberg Trials in World War II to be tried and convicted by an international court. In sum, the question whether a former Head of State might have immunity depends on which international court or tribunal endeavors to try him, how the court is constituted, and how it interprets its own mandate.
Read more about this topic: Universal Jurisdiction
Famous quotes containing the words immunity, state and/or officials:
“There is immunity in reading, immunity in formal society, in office routine, in the company of old friends and in the giving of officious help to strangers, but there is no sanctuary in one bed from the memory of another. The past with its anguish will break through every defence-line of custom and habit; we must sleep and therefore we must dream.”
—Cyril Connolly (1903–1974)
“I know this well, that if one thousand, if one hundred, if ten men whom I could name,—if ten honest men only,—ay, if one HONEST man, in this State of Massachusetts, ceasing to hold slaves, were actually to withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in the county jail therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in America. For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: what is once well done is done forever.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The ordinary man is an anarchist. He wants to do as he likes. He may want his neighbour to be governed, but he himself doesn’t want to be governed. He is mortally afraid of government officials and policemen.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)