Wednesday, January 10, 2001
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Wednesday, January 10, 2001 |
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Clinton's 11th-hour treaty threatens U.S. By AMY RILEY While we were ticking off the final minutes of the millennium, President Clinton was ticking off yet another order for his already dubious legacy. In the late hours of Dec. 31, 2000, President Clinton made a call from Camp David to David J. Scheffer, the U.S. Ambassador-at-large for war crime issues. During that call Scheffer was instructed to go to United Nations headquarters in New York City and sign the 1998 Treaty of Rome establishing an International Criminal Court (ICC). Midnight on Dec. 31 was the deadline for signing countries to get on board with the treaty. Beginning Jan. 1 the only way a country could become affiliated with the treaty is through ratification. What exactly does this mean for Americans? The International Criminal Court, as outlined in the 1998 Treaty of Rome, is to be the world's first permanent international war crimes tribunal for people accused of "crimes against humanity." The ICC will fall under the jurisdictional umbrella of the United Nations and will wield its global authority through a panel of 18 judges. Under the treaty, U.S. service men and women serving anywhere outside of the United States could be charged with a crime, apprehended, and brought to justice without benefit of American due process laws or other rights under the U.S. Constitution. In addition, the treaty grants the ICC jurisdiction over legislators, parliamentarians, and even heads of state. Article 28 of the treaty allows for senior officers and commanders to be held accountable for crimes committed by their subordinates, even without their having had prior knowledge that such activity was about to take place. In classic double-speak designed to lull us into a false sense of security, the treaty only aims to prosecute and try criminal cases if the country of origin cannot or will not do so themselves. What does this mean exactly? If a U.S. Court fails to produce the evidence necessary to bring a conviction and dismisses a case, then the ICC can take the case to The Hague. That's double jeopardy. Scary? You bet. The caveat for freedom lovers and those otherwise still committed to the notion of American sovereignty is that such a treaty, having received presidential authorization for acceptance, must now be ratified by the U.S. Senate. Now President-elect George Bush and his entourage of political appointees can add this stinky ICC business to the already long list of reign of error gaffes to be reexamined, and hopefully overturned. Buckle your seatbelts, folks, it ain't over yet. What is most compelling to me is that Clinton authorized U.S. acceptance of the treaty despite his own reservations about some of the language within the document. In a statement issued at the White House, Clinton stated that, "we are concerned that when the court comes into existence, it will not only exercise authority over personnel of states that have ratified the treaty, but also claim jurisdiction over personnel of states that have not." He went on to say that the treaty should not be submitted to the Senate by Bush until these "fundamental concerns are satisfied." Is this some sort of procedural vote so that the U.S. can stay in the UN/ICC game and help make the rules? It would seem so. There was immediate response from conservatives and anti-UN activists to block the punt, or recover the fumble, if you will. Some are calling for Bush to bring the treaty to the floor of the Senate right away where it will surely be defeated, thereby killing it once and for all in the U.S. Others have suggested that Bush should "unsign" the treaty, but no apparent precedent exists for such an act, which would (politically speaking) represent the erasure of a mistake. Senator Jesse Helms (R-NC) called the ICC a "kangaroo court," and vowed to block the treaty at the Senate floor. Sen. Helms has been perhaps the harshest critic of the United Nations and its far reach in to the coffers of the American treasury and storehouses of freedom. That Clinton's action was taken despite official opposition at the Pentagon could perhaps be the final insult to American service men and women, who no doubt thought that the dispensation in many cases of their right to vote in the November election was insult enough. Call your senators and let them know that you support our military personnel and will not tolerate this treaty and the "kangaroo court" it purports to establish. America is a sovereign nation. We will remain a free nation as long as we are willing to guard with our lives the cause of liberty and the laws of the Constitution. We have an extraordinary obligation to uphold the laws preserving the rights of our service men and women who lay their lives on the line every day upholding our freedom. [Your comments are welcome: ARileyFreePress@aol.com.]
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