Comment on government's intention to exit ICC

21 October 2016

The announcement today that the South African executive has issued notice of its intention to exit the International Criminal Court (ICC) is but one more instance of an executive increasingly contemptuous and brazen in its disregard for the rule of law.

Far from it being an international treaty that sources South Africa’s obligations in respect of the International Criminal Court, it is South Africa’s own democratically enacted law – the Implementation of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Act 27 of 2002 – that governs all relevant undertakings assumed by the South African government. There can be no lawful purported withdrawal from the Rome Statute of the ICC while the Implementation Act is in force.

Accordingly, the Minister of International Relations and Cooperation acts unlawfully and unconstitutionally in notifying the United Nations of South Africa’s intention to withdraw from the ICC.

As recently as March this year, South Africa’s Supreme Court of Appeal made clear the obligations South Africa had assumed in adopting the Implementation Act, holding that the law’s positioning of South Africa at the vanguard of attempts to prevent international crimes and, when they occur, cause the perpetrators to be prosecuted, was to be regarded as a “matter of national pride”, “wholly consistent with our commitment to human rights, both at a national and international level.”

Issued by Nicole Fritz, Executive Officer at Freedom Under Law, 21 October 2016