“[Speaker Johnson] said that if the ICC is allowed to threaten Israel's leaders, then we know that America will be next. Our response is: Of course!" Pandor exclaimed.
It ended months of speculation over whether Putin would travel to South Africa, which is a signatory to the Rome treaty that formed the International Criminal Court and therefore has the obligation to arrest the Russian leader if he sets foot on South African territory.
I’m aware of how it turned out, but, for the sake of clarity, I was speaking about a month prior to that outcome where the President of South Africa made it clear that he would now allow Putin to be arrested in the event that Putin chose to attend in person. Assuming his statements were straight forward, I even get the logical underpinnings of what he was saying here - it just seems an odd contrast for the SA government to turn around and champion the ICC months later. It’s hard to take a country that recently publicly pragmatized away the need to uphold the legitimacy of ICC authority seriously when they’re now using the ICC as a threat. Another country would be better to lead the charge here on behalf of the ICC.
It was very clear from the beginning that South Africa would not only be breaking international law by allowing Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to fly out of a military base but would be going against its own courts.
I’m aware of how it turned out, but, for the sake of clarity, I was speaking about a month prior to that outcome where the President of South Africa made it clear that he would now allow Putin to be arrested in the event that Putin chose to attend in person. Assuming his statements were straight forward, I even get the logical underpinnings of what he was saying here - it just seems an odd contrast for the SA government to turn around and champion the ICC months later. It’s hard to take a country that recently publicly pragmatized away the need to uphold the legitimacy of ICC authority seriously when they’re now using the ICC as a threat. Another country would be better to lead the charge here on behalf of the ICC.
South Africa also failed to arrest Omar Al Bashir, who is charged with genocide by the ICC.