THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE HAS LOST ITS CREDIBILITY!
Mahmoud Mobarak
Dar Al Hayat, Lebanon
March 6 2007
Perhaps one of the causes for pessimism about the ‘Permanent Court
of International Justice’, which was established by the League of
Nations after the end of World War I, lies in its name. The Court,
which was supposed to be ‘permanent’, only lasted two decades because
it failed to achieve ‘Justice’ for the peoples of Europe, which led
the European countries to resort to the use of military force as an
alternative. This, in turn, resulted in the outbreak of World War II,
the fall of the foundations of international legality, represented by
the League of Nations and its various bodies, including the ‘Permanent
Court of International Justice’.
Today, more than 60 years after the establishment of its heir, the
‘International Court of Justice’, we receive the recent decision
exonerating Serbia from the charge of committing genocide against the
Muslims of Bosnia/Herzegovina. The issue raises serious questions about
the true ‘justice’ of the highest international judicial institution
vis-a-vis issues affecting Muslims.
There is a clear inconsistency in the court’s senseless ruling,
which acknowledged that a ‘genocide’ had been committed, yet refused
to hold Serbia responsible before the international law, with all
the legal implications. This inconsistency might have drawn out the
International Court of Justice from ruling in a clear legal issue to
throw it into a dirty game of politics.
The slaughter committed by the Serbs against the Muslims during
the period between 1992-1995, killing more than 200,000 Muslims,
constitutes – beyond any controversy – what has come to be known
in international humanitarian law as ‘genocide’, which is the chief
‘crime against humanity’. Silence vis-a-vis such a heinous crime is
tantamount to heresy against the international Law.
However, this ruling has caused serious concern amongst many Muslims
who are still wondering: how long will the West’s bias continue
in classifying crimes according to its whims and desires? Until
when will Muslims remain a victim of attacks in Palestine, Lebanon,
Bosnia/Herzegovina, Afghanistan, Chechnya, Iraq and Somalia, only to
have the chief international organization come along and support these
attacks in its two aspects: the political in the form of the Security
Council, and the legal with the International Court of Justice?
How many victims will it take to satisfy this esteemed court to hold
Serbia responsible for the genocide in Bosnia/Herzegovina? Half a
million Muslims? A million Muslims?
Why is the application of international law only ever applied on weak
countries and Islamic countries, in particular, while the States that
invented these laws remain ‘immune’?
Will France, for example, ever admit that it committed ‘genocide’
in the land of a million martyrs, or will it remain satisfied to
demand the trial of Turkey for the crimes of genocide it was accused
of committing against the Armenians?
Is it not pathetically ironic that the Western countries are fervently
trying to save Darfur from the grip of the ‘savage’ government –
as they describe it – while turning a blind eye to the cries of the
Afghani people, whose country has been completely leveled, with more
than a million Afghans killed and displaced?
Is it justice and equality that the highest political authority in
the world establishes international committees to investigate the
assassination of a former prime minister, while the country of this
former prime minister is destroyed from one end to the other, with
no accountability or supervision?
Is the crime of genocide committed by the US in Iraq, where, up until
now, more than half a million Iraqis have been killed, less important
than the crimes of Saddam and his aides who were executed for the
crime of genocide against 148 persons?
Then again, if Muslim gangs were the ones who committed this genocide
crime, would you have seen the ‘civilized world’ call these acts
anything but ‘barbaric atrocities’ and ‘Islamic fascism’? Would the
Court have hesitated to condemn those gangs and rule against them?
How long will this Western disdain for the lives of Muslims and the
minds of their intellectuals, and non-intellectuals, last?
But what is strange about the judicial ruling issued last Monday is
that the tribunal recognized that ‘genocide’ had occurred, and that
the Serbian President and other Serb government officials were some
of the people involved. But in spite of this, Serbia as a State was
acquitted under the pretext that those who committed the ‘genocide’
bore the title of ‘elements’ of the Serb army. And because the crime
did not take place on Serbian territory, Serbia as a State does not
assume responsibility for the crime.
In reality, the acquittal of Serbia by the International Court
of Justice of any of the international legal implications of a
conviction on charges of ‘genocide’ in the case of Srebrenica is in
truth an acquittal of the UN forces. It also absolves Europe. This is
because the UN forces were in the vicinity, meters from the site of
the massacre of 10,000 Bosnian Muslims in the city Srebrenica, alone.
However, they did not move a muscle, but retreated and left
the area for the Serbian forces to complete their mission after
the Security Council had placed Srebrenica under international
protection. And after the UN troops had disarmed everyone belonging
to the Bosnia/Herzegovinian army, and after French General Philippe
Morillon assured the people of the town of Srebrenica that ‘there is
nothing left to fear’.
In short, then, the decision of the International Court of Justice
to acquit Serbia of the charge of committing genocide against the
Muslims of Bosnia/Herzegovina may not come as surprise, although it
did dash hopes. It comes as no surprise if we bear in mind that a
condemnation of Serbia, making internationally legally responsible
for the genocide could go beyond it to implicate the UN organization
itself – which the International Court of Justice is considered to be
one of its bodies. This is something the former Secretary General of
the UN himself pointed out when he said that ‘the ghost of Srebrenica
will haunt the international organization forever’.
Perhaps it is now appropriate for the Muslim countries to draw
together their disintegration, close their wounds and stop blaming
the West for all their trials and tribulations; beginning by taking
the first step on the road to forming an ‘Islamic Court of Justice’,
whereby all the Muslim countries would agree to its invocations.
There are over 45 Muslim States today, and if we add to this number
the States including influential Muslim minorities, then the number
will total 90 States. This figure is equivalent to nearly half of
the countries of the world. If these countries are collectively
able to achieve an international legal agreement, approved by the
many States from the Third World in Latin America, Africa and Asia,
then perhaps we can begin a new era of international law. In this
way, the disposed Muslims of the world, in Bosnia and elsewhere,
will not have to wait for Western pity to be bestowed on them. Until
this is achieved, the Bosnian man on the street will remain waiting
for justice from the heavens, after losing faith in justice on earth.
*Mahmoud Mubarak is an international jurist.
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