Friday, June 2, 2006

by Ivan Cairo
Caribbean Net News Suriname Correspondent
Email: ivan@caribbeannetnews.com

PARAMARIBO, Suriname: As part of a region-wide effort, the Coalition for the International Criminal Court (CICC) on Thursday called on Bahamas, Grenada, Haiti, Jamaica, St Lucia, St Kitts and Nevis, and Suriname to ratify or accede to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) as soon as possible in order to consolidate the Caribbean’s commitment to international justice and the global fight against impunity.

The CICC, an international network of more than 2,000 non-governmental and civil society organizations has asked these remaining CARICOM member states not only to join the ICC but to also include specific ICC-supportive language in the CARICOM’s Annual Conference of Heads of Government Resolution, which will be adopted in the first week of July 2006, said the CICC in a press release.

In a letter sent to Surinamese President Ronald Venetiaan on March 1, 2006, the CICC had already called on Suriname to accede to the ICC Statute. Suriname has shown an increased interest in becoming party to the ICC treaty.

In a December 2005 address to the Surinamese Parliament, Venetiaan indicated that his government was seriously considering acceding to the ICC treaty, while Suriname also co-hosted the first CARICOM Regional Conference on the ICC in June 2005 in Paramaribo which helped to revitalize dialogue about the ICC in the region.

The CICC’s letter to the seven CARICOM governments also highlighted the pivotal role Caribbean nations have played in the creation of the ICC. It was Trinidad & Tobago which in 1989, on behalf of CARICOM, called on the United Nation’s 44th General Assembly to consider the creation of an international criminal court.

By the end of that year all CARICOM member states helped to champion a final UN resolution which called for an ICC. Within the following decade, the Rome Statute was formally adopted in 1998 and came into force just four years later in July 2002.

To date, 100 countries, including CARICOM member states Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Guyana, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago, as well as fellow Caribbean nation, Dominican Republic, have all joined the ICC.

In the letter to governments, the CICC further acknowledged a number of recent ICC-related developments in the Caribbean that have helped re-invigorate regional support for the Court.

In late 2005, both Belize and Guyana took important strides by ratifying the Agreement on the Privileges and Immunities of the ICC which provides Court officials and staff with privileges and immunities similar to those given to UN bodies’ and other international organizations’ staff.

In February 2006, Trinidad and Tobago became the first CARICOM member to enact legislation implementing not only its obligations to cooperate with the ICC but also implementing all of the crimes under the Rome Statute into domestic law.

According to CICC Convenor William Pace, “the historic commitment of CARICOM member states to the idea of an international criminal court helped to pave the way for the creation and development of the ICC that we have before us today.”

“The full endorsement of those remaining CARICOM Member States to the ICC would show, once again, the Caribbean region’s strong support to the fight against impunity,” said Pace.

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