U.S. Impunity and International Conflicts

Cruise missiles being launched in the Mediterranean against the North African state of Libya. There have been over 40 people killed and many more injured by the U.S. and European military bombings., a photo by Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr.

Havana
June 23, 2011

U.S. impunity and international conflicts

HAVANA.—The United States, the principal violator of international law, will never appear before the International Criminal Court (ICC), in spite of its policy of aggression, interference and expansionism, stated Nicolás Fernández, member of the Cuban International Law Society, speaking at the 5th International Summer School, Havana 2011 and the 7th Humanitarian International Law Symposium.

Washington has signed 96 agreements with different countries to avoid its troops involved in conflicts being brought to trial at the ICC, he noted.

"At present, ways of arresting real criminals are nonexistent, and so we cannot try the former President George W. Bush, or former British Prime Minister Tony Blair," he said.

Both politicians were to a large extent responsible for unleashing a military conflict which cost the lives of thousands of civilians.

Impunity in the world is a given dating back to the very genesis of the United Nations, which was born with genetic flaws and whose functioning has now become complicated, the professor of Public International Law at the University of Havana noted.

"Impunity is the same as injustice and thus this negation of injustice promotes war criminals, crimes against humanity, genocide and forced disappearances," he added.

All the courts established to address the issue of impunity are adjusted to a concrete and personal norm, and do not try violations such as interference, thus it is justice of a selective nature, the expert emphasized.

"In practice, the law of impunity has emerged, which invalidates justice, manifested in amnesties, pardons, due disobedience and universal jurisdiction," Fernández explained.

"We could add that the International Criminal Court is not impartial, nor independent, that it is directed by the Security Council, which decides what proceedings to initiate and when they will end."

Today there is impunity in the so-called war in terrorism, and an alleged protection of persons and humanitarian missions mask what is interference. (PL)

Translated by Granma International