Day Four of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Assembly of States Parties (ASP) saw a number of developments.

The ICC Prosecutor released her office’s annual Report on Preliminary Examination Activities today. The report details the preliminary examination activities carried out by the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) between December 2018 – November 2019 in relation to nine situations under consideration for possible investigation. During the reporting period, one preliminary examination – the situation in Bangladesh/Myanmar – was completed and authorization to investigate was granted on November 14, 2019. As well, the OTP appealed the April 2019 decision by Pre-Trial Chamber II rejecting the request of the Prosecutor to proceed with an investigation of the situation in Afghanistan. The Prosecutor also filed her reconsideration decision with respect to the referral brought by the Comoros, following the Appeals Chamber’s judgement.

During 2019, the OTP continued its preliminary examinations of the situations in Colombia, Guinea, Iraq/United Kingdom, Nigeria, Palestine, the Philippines, and Ukraine, all of which are now at the admissibility stage (complementarity and gravity), and in Venezuela, where the OTP is assessing subject-matter jurisdiction.  The OTP also received 795 communications pursuant to article 15 of the Rome Statute. Of these, 617 were found to be manifestly outside the jurisdiction of the Court.

The ICC ASP held a plenary session on the topic of “Inter-State and Inter-Institutional cooperation at the heart of cooperation challenges”. Both the Prosecutor and Registrar provided thoughts on this theme, pointing to the need for enhanced state cooperation, given – for example – the number of outstanding arrest warrants. The plenary session also heard from panelists, states and civil society organizations. NGOs called on the ASP to tackle non-cooperation and on States Parties to enter into voluntary cooperation agreements with the Court on witness relocation, interim and final release, and sentence enforcement.

The final consultation on the annual omnibus resolution – “Strengthening the International Criminal Court and the Assembly of States Parties” – was held today. It will be put before the plenary tomorrow. Negotiations also continued today on the ICC’s 2020 budget.

Among the many side-events held today was one focused on “Accountability for International Crimes Committed Against Ethnic Minorities in Myanmar: Discussing Complementary Avenues for Justice”, co-sponsored by Canada, Liechtenstein, the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights, the Global Justice Center, the Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect, and the Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice. The event discussed the need for multiple forms of accountability to address Myanmar’s treatment of ethnic minorities – processes that will need to incorporate a strong gender perspective at every step. The panel considered how concurrent efforts at the ICC, the International Court of Justice, within third party states, and at the International Independent Mechanism for Myanmar need to act in a complementary manner in order to bring justice to the Rohingya and other minorities.

Day Five of the ICC ASP will see the introduction of draft resolutions to the plenary and a meeting of the Working Group on the budget.