War Crimes Law (Belgium)
Encyclopedia
Belgium
's War Crimes Law invokes the concept of universal jurisdiction
to allow anyone to bring war crime
charges in Belgian courts, regardless of where the alleged crimes have taken place.
Note that this is a Belgian law and is different from the International Criminal Court
, which is a treaty body to try war crime
s, and also different from the International Court of Justice
, which is a U.N.
body to settle disputes between countries. Both of these bodies reside in nearby The Hague
, Netherlands
, although some have said that American Servicemen's Protection Act passed by the US
was also directed against the War Crimes Law.
.
The law reached prominence after the Rwandan Genocide
. According to the Washington Post, the process of prosecution of Rwandans in Belgium for crimes committed in the violence were set in motion by Martine Beckers, a Brussels
resident, whose sister Claire called her to tell her of being attacked by soldiers, who soon after killed her, her family, and 10 other villagers who were unable to reach a United Nations
peacekeepers
' compound.http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A19835-2003Sep29?language=printer
or criminal
where those foreign nationals are alleged to have committed crimes against the complaining country's nationals, or have committed crimes in the complaining country.
What made this Belgian law controversial was that it afforded the right to anyone to submit a war crime for prosecution in Belgian courts that occurred anywhere in the world, whether on Belgian territory, and whether a Belgian national was involved as either criminal or victim. This concept called universal jurisdiction, or universal competence, was recently used in Germany
to indict high-ranking US officials for their involvement in prisoner abuse
in the war on terror
under the command responsibility
.
Over the years filings included cases against American officials, including George H. W. Bush
, Dick Cheney
, Colin Powell
, Norman Schwarzkopf and Tommy Franks
. Cases had also been filed against the leaders of many other countries, such as Iraq
and Israel
, and Cuba
's Fidel Castro
. The paperwork backing several of these filings was very limited, consisting out of a single fax or several pages.
Critics assailed the law as an attempt to circumvent the sovereignty
of other states
and become a venue for partisan
show trial
s of propaganda
value but no legal consequence. Proponents respond by arguing that universal jurisdiction is often the only recourse victims of war crimes have, and that under the UN Charter countries are already obliged to prosecute those involved in war crimes.
In an effort by the United States
to pressure Belgium, United States Secretary of Defense
Donald Rumsfeld
threatened to remove the NATO Headquarters from Brussels
unless the Law was changed.
announced that scrapping this law would be among the first acts carried out.
In September of that year, the Belgian Supreme Court threw out the cases against the former President Bush and other US officials, as well as Israelis.
Belgium, La Ligue des Droits de l'Homme (League for the Rights of Man), Liga voor Mensenrechten (League for Common Rights), la Fédération Internationale des Droits de l'homme (International Federation for Human Rights), Avocats sans Frontières (Lawyers without Borders) and Human Rights Watch
) called that loss of the universal jurisdiction component "a step backwards in the global fight against the worst atrocities."
Human Rights Watch outlined the reduced scope of the law:
annulled parts of the modified law which came in place of the Belgian War Crimes Law.
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
's War Crimes Law invokes the concept of universal jurisdiction
Universal jurisdiction
Universal jurisdiction or universality principle is a principle in public international law whereby states claim criminal jurisdiction over persons whose alleged crimes were committed outside the boundaries of the prosecuting state, regardless of nationality, country of residence, or any other...
to allow anyone to bring war crime
War crime
War crimes are serious violations of the laws applicable in armed conflict giving rise to individual criminal responsibility...
charges in Belgian courts, regardless of where the alleged crimes have taken place.
Note that this is a Belgian law and is different from the International Criminal Court
International Criminal Court
The International Criminal Court is a permanent tribunal to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression .It came into being on 1 July 2002—the date its founding treaty, the Rome Statute of the...
, which is a treaty body to try war crime
War crime
War crimes are serious violations of the laws applicable in armed conflict giving rise to individual criminal responsibility...
s, and also different from the International Court of Justice
International Court of Justice
The International Court of Justice is the primary judicial organ of the United Nations. It is based in the Peace Palace in The Hague, Netherlands...
, which is a U.N.
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
body to settle disputes between countries. Both of these bodies reside in nearby The Hague
The Hague
The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...
, Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, although some have said that American Servicemen's Protection Act passed by the US
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
was also directed against the War Crimes Law.
Background
The law took effect in 1993 and was expanded the following year after 10 Belgian soldiers were killed in RwandaRwanda
Rwanda or , officially the Republic of Rwanda , is a country in central and eastern Africa with a population of approximately 11.4 million . Rwanda is located a few degrees south of the Equator, and is bordered by Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo...
.
The law reached prominence after the Rwandan Genocide
Rwandan Genocide
The Rwandan Genocide was the 1994 mass murder of an estimated 800,000 people in the small East African nation of Rwanda. Over the course of approximately 100 days through mid-July, over 500,000 people were killed, according to a Human Rights Watch estimate...
. According to the Washington Post, the process of prosecution of Rwandans in Belgium for crimes committed in the violence were set in motion by Martine Beckers, a Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
resident, whose sister Claire called her to tell her of being attacked by soldiers, who soon after killed her, her family, and 10 other villagers who were unable to reach a United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
peacekeepers
Peacekeeping
Peacekeeping is an activity that aims to create the conditions for lasting peace. It is distinguished from both peacebuilding and peacemaking....
' compound.http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A19835-2003Sep29?language=printer
Universal jurisdiction
Countries have long claimed jurisdiction over nationals of other countries or suits against countries themselves in matters CivilCivil law (common law)
Civil law, as opposed to criminal law, is the branch of law dealing with disputes between individuals or organizations, in which compensation may be awarded to the victim...
or criminal
Criminal law
Criminal law, is the body of law that relates to crime. It might be defined as the body of rules that defines conduct that is not allowed because it is held to threaten, harm or endanger the safety and welfare of people, and that sets out the punishment to be imposed on people who do not obey...
where those foreign nationals are alleged to have committed crimes against the complaining country's nationals, or have committed crimes in the complaining country.
What made this Belgian law controversial was that it afforded the right to anyone to submit a war crime for prosecution in Belgian courts that occurred anywhere in the world, whether on Belgian territory, and whether a Belgian national was involved as either criminal or victim. This concept called universal jurisdiction, or universal competence, was recently used in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
to indict high-ranking US officials for their involvement in prisoner abuse
Prisoner abuse
Prisoner abuse is the mistreatment of persons while they are under arrest or incarcerated.Abuse falling into this category includes:* Physical abuse: Needless beating, hitting, or other corporal punishment....
in the war on terror
War on Terror
The War on Terror is a term commonly applied to an international military campaign led by the United States and the United Kingdom with the support of other North Atlantic Treaty Organisation as well as non-NATO countries...
under the command responsibility
Command responsibility
Command responsibility, sometimes referred to as the Yamashita standard or the Medina standard, and also known as superior responsibility, is the doctrine of hierarchical accountability in cases of war crimes....
.
Problems with implementation of the law
The law soon ran into trouble when a number of parties worldwide filed cases criticized as politically motivated against leaders of various nations.Over the years filings included cases against American officials, including George H. W. Bush
George H. W. Bush
George Herbert Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States . He had previously served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.Bush was born in Milton, Massachusetts, to...
, Dick Cheney
Dick Cheney
Richard Bruce "Dick" Cheney served as the 46th Vice President of the United States , under George W. Bush....
, Colin Powell
Colin Powell
Colin Luther Powell is an American statesman and a retired four-star general in the United States Army. He was the 65th United States Secretary of State, serving under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2005. He was the first African American to serve in that position. During his military...
, Norman Schwarzkopf and Tommy Franks
Tommy Franks
Tommy Ray Franks is a retired general in the United States Army. His last Army post was as the Commander of the United States Central Command, overseeing United States Armed Forces operations in a 25-country region, including the Middle East...
. Cases had also been filed against the leaders of many other countries, such as Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
and Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, and Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
's Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz is a Cuban revolutionary and politician, having held the position of Prime Minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976, and then President from 1976 to 2008. He also served as the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from the party's foundation in 1961 until 2011...
. The paperwork backing several of these filings was very limited, consisting out of a single fax or several pages.
Critics assailed the law as an attempt to circumvent the sovereignty
Sovereignty
Sovereignty is the quality of having supreme, independent authority over a geographic area, such as a territory. It can be found in a power to rule and make law that rests on a political fact for which no purely legal explanation can be provided...
of other states
Sovereign state
A sovereign state, or simply, state, is a state with a defined territory on which it exercises internal and external sovereignty, a permanent population, a government, and the capacity to enter into relations with other sovereign states. It is also normally understood to be a state which is neither...
and become a venue for partisan
Partisan (political)
In politics, a partisan is a committed member of a political party. In multi-party systems, the term is widely understood to carry a negative connotation - referring to those who wholly support their party's policies and are perhaps even reluctant to acknowledge correctness on the part of their...
show trial
Show trial
The term show trial is a pejorative description of a type of highly public trial in which there is a strong connotation that the judicial authorities have already determined the guilt of the defendant. The actual trial has as its only goal to present the accusation and the verdict to the public as...
s of propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
value but no legal consequence. Proponents respond by arguing that universal jurisdiction is often the only recourse victims of war crimes have, and that under the UN Charter countries are already obliged to prosecute those involved in war crimes.
In an effort by the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
to pressure Belgium, United States Secretary of Defense
United States Secretary of Defense
The Secretary of Defense is the head and chief executive officer of the Department of Defense of the United States of America. This position corresponds to what is generally known as a Defense Minister in other countries...
Donald Rumsfeld
Donald Rumsfeld
Donald Henry Rumsfeld is an American politician and businessman. Rumsfeld served as the 13th Secretary of Defense from 1975 to 1977 under President Gerald Ford, and as the 21st Secretary of Defense from 2001 to 2006 under President George W. Bush. He is both the youngest and the oldest person to...
threatened to remove the NATO Headquarters from Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
unless the Law was changed.
Most cases dropped
On July 12, 2003, the incoming government of Prime Minister Guy VerhofstadtGuy Verhofstadt
Guy Verhofstadt is a Belgian politician who was the 47th Prime Minister of Belgium from 1999 to 2008. He is currently a Member of the European Parliament and leader of the Group of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.- Early career :...
announced that scrapping this law would be among the first acts carried out.
In September of that year, the Belgian Supreme Court threw out the cases against the former President Bush and other US officials, as well as Israelis.
Modified law and criticism
Six human rights groups (Amnesty InternationalAmnesty International
Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...
Belgium, La Ligue des Droits de l'Homme (League for the Rights of Man), Liga voor Mensenrechten (League for Common Rights), la Fédération Internationale des Droits de l'homme (International Federation for Human Rights), Avocats sans Frontières (Lawyers without Borders) and Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...
) called that loss of the universal jurisdiction component "a step backwards in the global fight against the worst atrocities."
Human Rights Watch outlined the reduced scope of the law:
- Belgian courts will only have jurisdiction over international crimes if the accused is Belgian or has his primary residence in Belgium; if the victim is Belgian or has lived in Belgium for at least three years at the time the crimes were committed; or if Belgium is required by treaty to exercise jurisdiction over the case. The new law also considerably reduces victims' ability to obtain direct access to the courts - unless the accused is Belgian or has his primary residence in Belgium, the decision whether to proceed with any complaint rests entirely with the state prosecutor. http://www.hrw.org/press/2003/08/belgium080103.htm
Court of Arbitration
On June 21, 2006, Belgium's Constitutional Court, the Court of Arbitration of BelgiumCourt of Arbitration of Belgium
The Constitutional Court of Belgium plays a central role within the federal Belgian state. This is a judicial court founded in 1980. Its jurisdiction was augmented in 1988 and 2003.-History:...
annulled parts of the modified law which came in place of the Belgian War Crimes Law.