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Kenya

Africa blasts ICC as world crimes court members meet

– ‘No political will ‘ –

Bensouda told AFP in an interview that there was “no political will” in Kenya to try the cases.

The AU’s criticism “does not match the reality… It is a blanket criticism,” she said.

Despite all the cases so far at the trial stage being from Africa, Bensouda said: “All the cases that we have, except Kenya, Sudan and Libya, all those cases were at the request of African states asking for the ICC’s intervention.”

Regarding South Africa, she said Pretoria “should have arrested Bashir and surrendered him to the ICC, once he found himself on the territory of South Africa, which is a state party to the Rome statute, part of the ICC, and has treaty obligations under the statute.”

But South African Foreign Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane told AFP Pretoria “could not arrest Bashir because he was attending an AU summit as an international head of state.”

South Africa vigorously maintained that its obligations to the AU, which included granting immunity to attending heads of state, trumped the laws of the ICC.

The case is currently before a South African court, while ICC judges have given Pretoria more time to explain their failure to arrest Bashir.

African states form the largest bloc at the ICC assembly, with 34 countries, followed by South America with 27.

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