International Criminal Court

Thomas Lubanga, a Congolese militia leader facing charges of recruiting child soldiers to rape and kill, on Monday became the first defendant to go on trial at the International Criminal Court at The Hague. The court is the world's first permanent venue to prosecute war crimes, genocide and other major crimes against humanity. Cases such as these have mostly been tried at temporary courts, from Nuremberg, Germany, to more recent U.N.

In a move that could inject a new international actor into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the International Criminal Court will examine requests to investigate alleged war crimes during the recent combat in the Gaza Strip, its chief prosecutor said Wednesday. Luis Moreno-Ocampo, chief prosecutor of the Netherlands-based court, said he had decided to consider an investigation after the Palestinian Authority accepted the jurisdiction of the court last week.

The arrest warrant issued last week for Sudan President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir has thrown into stark relief a question the Obama administration and Congress need to address: What are we going to do about the International Criminal Court? The desire for a permanent criminal court to try individuals accused of crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide has been around since the Nuremberg trials.

The Nuremberg trials at the close of World War II were controversial in their day. Advocates saw civilized nations imposing just retribution for acts of depravity; critics saw an exercise of victors' justice, with rules of warfare imposed after the fact. From that divisive history emerged a movement to create a permanent international court in which charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity could be heard -- and a long debate over the wisdom of the idea.

Re "Judging the ICC," editorial, March 16 The Times' editorial ignores a gradual approach of U.S. reengagement that could lead eventually to ratification. First, the U.S. could participate as an observer in the International Criminal Court's governing body, the Assembly of States Parties, from which it has been absent since the court was established in 2002. Second, the U.S. could reactivate the U.S. signature of the ICC treaty, demonstrating that it will not undermine the treaty (as the Bush administration wanted)

Re "When mass rape turns into genocide," Opinion, Nov. 13 David Scheffer is correct. The International Criminal Court must include the crime of rape as genocide in its long-anticipated arrest warrant for Sudan's president, Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir. The threat of these arrest warrants has finally caused a change in the status quo, after six years of genocide. Recognizing that rape is a tool of genocide sends a clear message that rape is a crime that diminishes humanity as a whole.

The ringleader of the 1994 Rwanda genocide was sentenced Thursday to life in prison for his role in the early days of an ethnic slaughter that eventually killed an estimated 800,000 people. Theoneste Bagosora, 67, is the highest-ranking military officer convicted at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. The former colonel's prosecution is viewed as a significant step in efforts to punish war crimes.

A Congolese warlord accused of sending child soldiers to fight in a vicious tribal conflict was ordered Monday to stand trial at the International Criminal Court. A three-judge chamber found evidence strong enough to "establish substantial grounds to believe" that Thomas Lubanga was responsible "for war crimes consisting of enlisting and conscripting children under the age of 15," said presiding Judge Claude Jorda of France.

Sudan said that the International Criminal Court had no jurisdiction over its nationals and that the government would not allow any of its citizens, including rebels, to be tried outside Sudan, local media reported. Sudanese media also reported that Khartoum would put a number of people on trial next week, including military personnel, for alleged involvement in attacks in the Darfur region in Sudan's west.

The International Criminal Court on Wednesday issued its first arrest warrants in Sudan's Darfur conflict, for a government minister and a former militia leader accused of war crimes. Sudanese officials, however, said they would not hand over the pair, who are charged with dozens of counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity.