Stephen Rapp, the U.S. Ambassador-at-large for war crimes issues, declared this week in Bangladesh that “(p)re-charging detention is not automatically a violation of international standards.” This statement could be taken innocuously – as arguably true; or it could be taken as an implicit nod of approval by the U.S. for the illegal detention and torture of suspected Bangladeshi war criminals by the International Crimes Tribunal in Bangladesh.
The I.C.T. was set up to prosecute crimes that occurred during the 1971 struggle for independence from Pakistan. As many as 3 million Bangladeshis were killed in the violence. Rapp visited with officials of the tribunal last week and repeatedly called for efforts to keep the tribunal transparent, open, and compliant with international law.
But the pre-charging detention of the type that the Bangladeshi security forces are accused of would be more akin to the controversial standards practiced by the U.S. military at Guantanamo Bay, than they would be in line with the principles of international tribunals such as the Special Court for Sierra Leone and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda that Rapp has previously served at.
Rapp said that he would request for Congress to authorize the U.S. to provide documentary support and aid for training of participants for the International Crimes Tribunal in Bangladesh as long as efforts were made to clean up the statutory language of the 1973 International Crimes (Tribunal) Act that authorized the creation of the tribunal.
Recommendations have been made by many international organizations including the International Bar Association to stop the I.C.T. from forcing self-incriminating testimony, to allow for constitutional challenges by defendants to tribunal jurisdiction and decisions, and to provide for ‘habeas corpus’ rights to defendants as provided for by Article 14 of the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (I.C.C.P.R.) and Article 55 of the Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court. These recommendations are widely seen to be the international standards by which the I.C.T. needs to conform to.
Bangladesh, however, arrested five leaders of opposition party Jamaat-i-Islami last year on charges such as ‘offending religious sentiments‘ with the intention to prosecute them in connection with war crimes later at the tribunal. At least some of the suspects have been reported to have been tortured.
Another possible motivation behind this statement may simply be realpolitik – Ambassador Rapp, keenly aware of abuses occurring, wants to help guard against defendants crying foul at the tribunal if they are indeed guilty of war crimes.
Other international tribunals have successfully managed to avoid pre-charge detention of defendants. It is unclear whether Rapp’s declaration tacitly offers support of Bangladeshi actions; inadvertently undermines the international legal standards that the international community expects the tribunal to conform to; or whether it is an academic distinction without practical consequence meant to protect against impunity for war criminals that have had their civil rights abused. In the meantime it remains politically expedient for it to be all three.
