The short arm of international law

The war crimes trial of the former Yugoslav president, Slobodan Milosevic, marks an important step towards the assertion of universal human rights. As the chief prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, put it at the opening of proceedings in The Hague, the prosecution of Milosevic, for genocide and other crimes relating to "ethnic cleansing" in the Balkans in the 1990s, is a "powerful demonstration ... that no-one is beyond the reach of international justice". But, while the Milosevic case sets an important precedent, it also highlights the limits of the "international justice" the tribunal represents.

Just days before the tribunal at The Hague was convened, the UN abandoned negotiations with the Cambodian Government over the establishment of an international court to try the surviving members of the former Khmer Rouge regime. Between 1975 and 1978, almost 2 million Cambodians, or about 20 per cent of the population, were executed or had died of starvation and disease in labour camps under a Maoist regime bent on creating a purist proletariat state. So far no-one has been tried and all but two senior Khmer Rouge officials remain free. Without a UN-run trial, these two may soon be released under Cambodian laws which limit the period of detention without trial.

The assertion of the rule of law is central to the restoration of any society which has suffered the trauma of genocide, war crimes or human rights abuses. In this restoration process, international as well as national efforts are called for. That is a good reason for a permanent international criminal court. But the campaign for one has so far failed, mostly because of opposition from the U.S. which is unwilling to risk exposing its citizens to the reach of international justice.

The UN says it pulled out of the proposed Khmer Rouge trials because it believes the Cambodian Government is not impartial and would protect selected individuals. The UN should reconsider its refusal to back the proposed trials as it has been urged to do by the U.S. and France.

Efforts to prosecute more recent crimes against humanity in East Timor and Sierra Leone have similarly failed. The fact that Milosevic now stands in the dock in The Hague is, without doubt, a significant victory for human dignity. But much remains to be done to make true the chief prosecutor's assertion that no-one is beyond the reach of international justice.

-- The Sydney Morning Herald