International Criminal Court serves criminals: Activist

Press TV has conducted an interview with Ken O’Keefe, a former Mavi Marmara Flotilla activist, to discuss a recent ICC probe into Israeli raid of the Gaza-bound humanitarian aid flotilla.

Following is a rough transcription.

Press TV: First of all, what do you make of [Fatou] Bensouda’s initial assessments that the attack on Mavi Marmara was not a serious enough case for a full war crime probe?

O’Keefe: Well, there is simply no question that the ICC and let me just say that when the ICC was formed in July 1, 2002 I was actually in Amsterdam, Netherlands at the time and like many people I was very excited at the prospect of actually having international law function as it should; but, ever since 2002, the International Criminal Court has proven itself to be nothing more than a servant to a system of tyranny which we see is resulting in war around the world consistently.

The only nations that are getting prosecuted for the most serious crimes generally are African nations and the only other exception to that really is Milošević. But we have of course no charges being filed against George Bush or Tony Blair for the blatantly criminal act of invading a sovereign nation without any justification whatsoever.

This is an act of aggression and if we went back to the Nuremberg principles this was considered the supreme crime. So the International Criminal Court has been very consistent in its role of protecting the worst criminals and the worst crimes ever since its inception in 2002.

Press TV: here we do have a panel of judges which is told Bensouda to go back and revise this case saying she has made errors as far as looking through and investigating it and yet she appeals it. Why do you think that is so?

O’ Keefe: Well, this actually reveals a very big problem with the International Criminal Court system. There is ultimately total power within the chief prosecutor’s office; so as long as the powers that be can control that one individual, they basically control international law as it is punished.

So they have obviously got control of her, they had control of her predecessor and the panel of judges, while they may be exhibiting some level of honor and integrity in referring the case back to her, the fact is that she is controlled.

So it is not really going to change until we change the system and put the power back into the people of the world who insist that war is not the means to settle disputes and in fact insist that international law is applied and applied evenly, not very arbitrarily and against poor and weak nations while the rich, powerful nations get away with the most incredible crimes ever. 

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