Magister Legum - LLM (Criminal Justice and Procedure) / Since 2009, the first permanent international criminal court's operation is known to
be marked by diplomatic tension between the African Union (AU) and the ICC. A
host of African member states have called for African states parties to withdraw en
masse from the International Criminal Court (ICC). On the 19th October 2016,
South Africa's Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, without prior
parliamentary approval, deposited an official notice of withdrawal from the ICC in
terms of Article 127(1) of the Rome Statute. The Pretoria High Court, however, in
Democratic Alliance v Minister of International Relations ruled the notice instrument
to be "unconstitutional and invalid." This research paper evaluates South Africa's
unsuccessful proposed withdrawal, against the backdrop of AU and ICC tensions.
Accordingly, the paper critically evaluates South Africa's reasons for a proposed
ICC withdrawal, its subsequent failure and the domestic and international
implications of either a future successful withdrawal or South Africa's continued
membership. The paper's findings conclude that South Africa's attempted
withdrawal was primarily based on the diplomatic breakdown between South Africa
and the ICC which arose out of the states party's non-cooperation with an arrest
warrant for Sudan's sitting head of state, President Omar Al-Bashir, at the 25th
Ordinary Session of the African Union Assembly in Johannesburg, June 2015. It is
presented, that South Africa's proposed withdrawal was premature and that any
future withdrawal from the ICC will have far-reaching legal and political
ramifications. Further, this study reaffirms the need for the country's continued
contribution to building a stronger, effective and more universal framework of
international criminal justice, domestically and from within the ICC.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:uwc/oai:etd.uwc.ac.za:11394/6258 |
| Date | January 2018 |
| Creators | Watkins, Laura-Jane |
| Contributors | Werle, Gerhard |
| Publisher | University of the Western Cape |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | University of the Western Cape |
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