US again wants UN to place it beyond the law

[k hanly <khanly@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The Bush administration wants the U.N. Security
Council to renew a controversial resolution exempting American peacekeepers
from prosecution by the new International Criminal Court.

Two years ago the same resolution was adopted unanimously after the United
States threatened to veto U.N. peacekeeping missions, one by one. A year
ago, three countries abstained.

This year at least four nations -- Brazil, Spain, Germany and France -- are
expected to abstain. But the measure will probably reach the minimum nine
votes needed for adoption in the 15-nation council, diplomats said.

Although all 15 European Union nations have ratified the treaty creating the
court and are financing most of its costs, close U.S. ally Britain is
expected to vote in favour.

As the first permanent global criminal court, the ICC was set up to try
perpetrators for the world's worst atrocities -- genocide, mass war crimes
and systematic human rights abuses.

The tribunal went into operation in The Hague, Netherlands, this year and is
investigating massacres in the Congo and by the brutal Lord's Resistance
Army in northern Uganda.

The draft resolution, introduced by the United States on Wednesday, would
place U.S. troops and officials serving in U.N.-approved-missions beyond the
reach of the court.

Specifically, it would exempt "current or former officials" from prosecution
or investigation if the individual comes from a country that did not ratify
a 1998 Rome treaty that established the tribunal.

The United States argues it cannot put itself under the jurisdiction of a
foreign court it did not authorise and says its many troops abroad would be
open to politically motivated prosecutions.

Proponents of the court say that there are enough safeguards in its statutes
to protect countries like the United States, which has a functioning
judicial system that would take priority over egregious cases.

"It's outrageous, considering everything that has happened to U.S. armed
forces in Iraq -- and then to flip it through with less than 48 hours
notice," said Richard Dicker, a counsel with the New York-based Human Rights
Watch.

Of the 15 Security Council members, Britain, France, Germany, Spain, Brazil,
Romania and Benin are among the 94 nations whose legislatures have ratified
the treaty creating the court.

Russia, Chile, Algeria, Angola and the Philippines have signed but not
ratified it and China and Pakistan have neither signed nor ratified.

The United States, under former President Bill Clinton, was one of 135
nations that signed the treaty, but the Bush administration rescinded the
signature.


http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsArticle.jhtml?type=to
pNews&storyID=5205172