Bensouda this week received world-wide support for the high-profile post/FILE
Gambia’s Fatou Bensouda this week received world-wide support for the high-profile post which will be vacated by current prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo by the middle of next year.
“I am deeply grateful for the nomination and remain committed to the goals of the court to end impunity for those responsible for the gravest offences, bring justice to their victims and prevent future crimes,” she said in a statement from the Hague-based court.
Bensouda, currently the court’s deputy prosecutor, is the last remaining candidate for the top job.
She is now certain to be elected by ICC member countries at an election in New York on December 12.
Bensouda will take over from Moreno-Ocampo, who has issued arrest warrants for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity against the likes of Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir and Libya’s late dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
Because of the focus on Africa, leaders from the continent had pressed for Moreno-Ocampo’s successor to come from Africa.
The 119 current signatories of the Rome Statute that set up the ICC held an informal meeting on Thursday when Christian Wenaweser, Liechtenstein’s ambassador to the UN, told them that Bensouda was the only remaining candidate.
Bensouda has been Moreno-Ocampo’s deputy since 2004 and is a former justice minister in Gambia.
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