For an effective international law : from the preparatory committee to the diplomatic conference for the establishment of an international criminal court : the commitment of the international community [Flavia Lattanzi]

Abstract

Under the Geneva Conventions, as has already been pointed out, States have committed themselves to certain obligations which compel them to exercise criminal jurisdiction over persons responsible for, or suspected of crimes (against genocide, apartheid, torture, etc.). According to some, these obligations relate only to states connected with such criminal cases. The Geneva Convention for war crimes establishes the criterion of universal jurisdiction which carries with it the duty to search - because it is useless establishing the principle of universal jurisdiction unless one carries out a search. And we have seen that in France, where the persons who planned and incited the massacres in Rwanda took refuge, the French judges refused to exercise their jurisdiction. In the absence of a link ( or of a strong link, as there actually was a sort of link), the Court had been put into action by a woman of Rwandese origin married to a Frenchman and holding French citizenship. [excerpt]