PRELIMINARY REMARKS

As reported in the previous chapters, at the end of the six-week diplomatic conference held in Rome in 1998, 120 countries voted in favour of the Rome Statute. The political support and the development of the treaty-law meant the establishment of new public institutions committed to end the impunity of the gravest crimes known to humanity and bring justice to the victims. The Rome Statute institutions are: the International Criminal Court with exclusively a judicial mandate, the Assembly of States Parties which is the management oversight and legislative body of the Court, and the Trust Fund for Victims implementing Court-ordered reparations and provide physical and psychosocial rehabilitation or material support to victims of crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court. The US joined China, Libya, Iraq, Israel, Qatar, and Yemen as the only seven countries voting in opposition to the treaty, while twenty-one countries abstained. When looking at: a) the rejection of the Rome Statute by powerful States; b) the political impasse at the regional level as for instance in the African Union; and c) the difficulties of complementarity at international level, we notice that cooperation is very difficult to realize. In order to implement a global architecture fostering peace, justice and security able to influence ‘l’état de droit’ and the institutional capacity-building in domestic realities, competence allocation, delimitation of competence, institutional reform, mutual and complementing support between such international institutions, are fundamental preconditions of democratic governance involved in the prevention of mass atrocities, including the importance of their working methods in case of international interventions and judicial referrals in situations of war and crime.

The first section of this chapter focuses on the institutional contours characterizing the emerging regime of international criminal justice responsible of a systemic change promoting the links between human security and justice (Assembly of States Parties, Trust Fund for Victims and the Court). In order to build a model of international criminal justice it is important to start with strong fundaments at institutional, administrative and legislative levels complementing an independent international judiciary. Such institutional contours dealing with human rights and justice represent the indicator of public authority and the resources allocated in these fields of global governance.