Monitoring Policy Making at the United Nations |
| ||||||||||||
UN Prosecutor Believes International Tribunal Best for Bin Laden - International Justice - Global Policy Forum UN Prosecutor Believes
International Tribunal Best
for Bin LadenBy Nicole Winfield
Associated Press
December 20, 2001The chief U.N. war crimes prosecutor told reporters Wednesday an international tribunal would be the best way to prosecute Osama bin Laden for the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
But the U.S. ambassador-at-large for war crimes said the United States plans to exercise jurisdiction and try bin Laden under a "U.S. process" if he is ever captured.
There has been no serious discussion of creating a U.N. tribunal for Afghanistan. But U.N. prosecutor Carla del Ponte's comments added to the debate about what to do with bin Laden or his supporters if they are captured.
Afghanistan's new leader Hamid Karzai sparked the issue when he told a news conference in Rome that bin Laden should face international justice for the devastation he brought to the United States, Afghanistan and elsewhere. He left open the question of who should oversee the process.
"A man like that who has committed crimes worldwide must be given to international justice," he said at the end of a two-day trip to Rome to pay his respects to Afghanistan's exiled king.
Later, journalists who had attended the Karzai news conference raised the issue with Del Ponte at a separate press conference. She said an international tribunal would be an ideal way to handle any prosecution of bin Laden, considering the magnitude of the attacks.
"For so grave a fact, it definitely seems to me to be one of the best possibilities to be able to conduct a process before an international tribunal," she said.
She stressed that her comments were her personal opinion and that she had no jurisdiction over Afghanistan.
The U.S. ambassador at large for war crimes, Pierre-Richard Prosper, said the United States believed it had jurisdiction over the attacks "and we plan to exercise jurisdiction."
"As for bin Laden, he is indicted in the United States for his role in the embassy bombings (in Africa) and we would like to see him stand trial for those events in the United States or through a United States process," he said, speaking in The Hague, Netherlands.
If the United Nations were to get involved in any international tribunal for Afghanistan, it would not allow the death penalty, which is permitted in U.S. courts. Two ad hoc U.N. courts for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, as well as the statute for the International Criminal Court, do not allow for the death penalty.
Karzai said he didn't know where bin Laden or Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar were, but he pledged to hunt them down.
"There's no way we can allow them to stay," Karzai said. "They've killed our people. They have destroyed our land. We will finish them to the end."
Karzai came to Italy to pay his respects to the 87-year-old former Afghan king, Mohammad Zaher Shah, considered the symbolic father of Afghans.
Zaher Shah gave the new leader his blessing and a copy of the Quran, or Muslim holy book, in a brief appearance outside his high-security Roman villa Tuesday night.
Karzai told reporters that he envisioned an international peacekeeping force of 3,000 to 5,000 troops who would be authorized to use force not only in self-defense, but to keep the peace until an Afghan defense force can take over.
"If it takes the use of force to keep the peace, why not?" he said. "The basic element is to keep peace”.
Karzai was selected to head Afghanistan's interim administration at U.N.-sponsored talks in Germany earlier this month and will rule along with a 29-member Cabinet for six months.
The king, seen by many as a unifying figure, is to then convene a grand national assembly, or loya jirga, to choose a government to lead Afghanistan for two years while a constitution is drafted and a judicial system and police force are put into place.
The king, who has lived in Rome since his 1973 ouster, could depart for Afghanistan to start making plans for the tribal assembly within the next month or two, said an adviser, Zalmai Rassoul.
More Information on International Justice
FAIR USE NOTICE: This page contains copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Global Policy Forum distributes this material without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. We believe this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in 17 U.S.C ß 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond fair use, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
