Before being appointed judge at the International Criminal Court, the Canadian Kimberly Prost had the role of ensuring that individuals who were sanctioned for links with Al-Qaeda deserved to appear on this blacklist.
Manitoban acted within the United Nations Security Council to prevent slippages.
And now it is today that is the subject of such a slippage.
Photo taken from the International Criminal Court website
La Juge Kimberly Prost
Not by amalgamation or error on the person. No, no, knowingly. On Wednesday, the Trump administration decided to impose sanctions on the Canadian judge. Unheard of.
The American government, which has been carrying out an active campaign against the International Criminal Court (ICC) since last winter, does not accuse the magistrate of having links with a terrorist organization or even merchant weapons or drugs, as is usually the case when international sanctions are imposed. No, he is criticized for having done his job. Nothing more.
And this work carried out it, with other judges of the Hague Court, to authorize in 2020 an investigation into war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the war in Afghanistan from May 2003.
This investigation, which was to target both the Taliban and the staff of the American armed forces and the CIA, led to the issuance of two arrest warrants against Taliban high -ranking soldiers, but to no accusation against Americans. And it has been more or less on the back and night since 2021.
All this recalls memories to James Kirkpatrick Stewart, which I joined at his home in Kitchener, Ontario. This Canadian lawyer was a deputy prosecutor at the International Criminal Court when the Afghan investigation was announced in 2020. “My own boss, Fatou Bensouda, and another colleague were victims of sanctions by the first Trump administration, but that did not turn the work from the court. The court had done everything to protect its craftsmen and the international community had come to the defense of the court, ”recalls the one who worked at the ICC until 2022.
Photo taken from the International Criminal Court website
The lawyer James Kirkpatrick Stewart
At the time, Mike Pompeo, who was US Secretary of State, had threatened any journalists, lawyers and investigators who were going to contribute to the work of the International Tribunal. The latter, it should be remembered, a mandate is to judge the accused individuals of the most serious crimes affecting the entire international community, that is to say genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and crime of aggression.
The United States, which is not among the member states of the International Criminal Court, have always considered that its nationals could not be targeted by the ICC. But that’s not what international law says. The Court considers that it can investigate and continue anyone who rages in the territory of a Member State – including Afghanistan. And occupied Palestinian territories.
He is also there, the knot of the case.
In February, the Trump 2.0 administration embarked on a Crusade 2.0 against employees of the International Criminal Court after the program of Insraélian Prime Minister, Benyamin Netanyahu, the former Israeli Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant and two leaders of Hamas, who died today. In his presidential decree on this subject, Donald Trump affirms that the court “posed illegitimate and baseless actions targeting the United States and [leur] Close ally Israel ”and accuses him of endangering his staff all over the world.
The chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, of British origin, was the first targeted by sanctions. The latter announced in May that he was taking a break from his duties.
On Wednesday, the list of punishments went down. The two assistant prosecutors, who replaced Mr. Khan at the head of the court, are targeted as well as the French judge Nicolas Guillou. The United States criticizes these three lawyers for having played a role in arrest warrants aimed at Israeli leaders.
“It is an abusive exercise in the power of sanctions and it is unjustified,” said James Kirkpatrick Stewart on this subject. It is, in my opinion, the litote of the century.
If it was already odious to sanction prosecutors to make their lives more difficult, it is even more serious to attack judges. “I have been interested in international justice for 40 years and I have never seen that. This is unprecedented, ”confirmed Pierre Trudel, professor emeritus of the Faculty of Law of the University of Montreal.
The targeted judges are Canadian and French, moreover. It is a frontal attack against the independence of the judiciary and, by the band, a stroke of warning against allied governments which still defend the primacy of law.
The President of the French Republic, Emmanuel Macron, reacted with force to this salvo against the ICC. Ditto for the United Nations, International Amnesty and the International Criminal Court itself.
What about Canada? Ah! It is discreet, Canada! According to a government source, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Anita Anand, expressed her “dissatisfaction” in Marco Rubio, the American Secretary of State, whom she met for the first time in person in Washington on Thursday.
Not a word in public. The two chief diplomats did not take questions from journalists. Just a beautiful handshake in front of the cameras.
I was also promised a Canada World Affairs statement that I had not received more than 30 hours after the announcement of sanctions.
It is not much, very little, to defend a court which was largely built by Canadians and whose mission is more relevant than ever. The proof is precisely in the attacks it undergoes.
