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Hinweise auf Veranstaltungen, Symposien, Vorträge |
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David Jones: Responding to Genocide - The Role of Criminal Punishment. |
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| | | Neben einem Frühwarnsystem ist das energische Vorgehen gegen die weltweite Straflosigkeit von schweren Menschenrechtsverletzungen und Völkermorden für David H. Jones, Professor em. für Philosophie (Wisconsin), der wichtigste Schritt zur Genozidprävention. |
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Anhand von gesetzlichen, rechtlichen und ethischen Überlegungen erörtert Jones Möglichkeiten, der fehlenden Strafverfolgung von Verstößen gegen die Menschlichkeit ein Ende zu setzen und plädiert für ein stärkeres Engagement der Völkergemeinschaft.
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Strafrechtliche Verfolgung von Haupttätern unerlässlich |
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Aus der gesetzlichen Perspektive ist die strafrechtliche Verfolgung der Hauptverantwortlichen unerlässlich, wenn das Bewusstsein von Rechtsstaatlichkeit auf internationaler Ebene verankert werden soll. Dahingehende Bestrebungen sind nicht neu: Seit den Nürnberger Prozessen ist eine Berufung auf Immunität seitens politischer und militärischer Führungskräfte nicht mehr möglich. Regierungen, wie auch ihre Vertreter, sind über den nationalen Rahmen hinaus dem Völkerrecht verpflichtet.
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Vergehen gegen das Völkerrecht kaum geahndet |
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Dennoch können die Vorgaben des Völkerrechts erst bindend werden, wenn entsprechende Vergehen auch geahndet werden. Dass dies zur Zeit kaum geschieht zeigt Jones an der zögerlichen Vorgehensweise am Fall des ehemaligen serbischen Präsidenten Slobodan Milosevic oder der beiden bosnischen Serbenführer Radovan Karadzic und Ratko Mladic auf. Alle drei wurden vom Internationalen Gerichtshof angeklagt, diesbezügliche Schritte blieben jedoch lange aus bzw. sind noch immer nicht wirksam geworden.
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Politische und militärische Anführer meist verantwortlich |
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Aus ethischen Gründen sind sie jedoch als Haupttäter zu betrachten und auf jeden Fall zur Verantwortung zu ziehen. Denn es sind die politischen und militärischen Anführer, die Genozid planen, billigen, befehlen und durchführen, weshalb sie laut Jones ungeachtet ihrer Position eine angemessene Bestrafung verdienen.
Die strafrechtliche Verfolgung von Hauptverantwortlichen soll auch in Hinblick auf ihre abschreckende Wirkung forciert werden. Wenn die einzelnen Staaten ebenso wie die Völkergemeinschaft sich endlich durchringen würden, die Haupttäter konsequent zu bestrafen, bestünde die Möglichkeit, dass potentielle Täter angesichts der zu erwartenden Folgen von ihren Vorhaben Abstand nehmen.
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David H. JONES
Professor em. für Philosophie am William and Mary College in Virginia, Fachgebiet: Genozidaufarbeitung und -prävention, Strafverfolgung und Ethik. Verfasser von Moral Responsibility in the Holocaust: A Study in the Ethics of Character. |
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Abstract |
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I shall defend the thesis that criminal punishment of principal perpetrators of genocide and similar crimes against humanity should by given a high priority by the international community alongside other measures such as an early warning system and a rapid deployment force to prevent incipient atrocities. I shall be discussing the crime of genocide as my main example, however, I believe my argument applies equally to other violations of human rights.
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I shall defend the main thesis on three interrelated grounds: on the legal ground that punishing principal perpetrators of genocide is necessary in order to vindicate the rule of law at the international level; on the ethical ground that principal perpetrators of genocide are especially culpable and blameworthy and are thus deserving of severe criminal punishment in accordance with the principle of just retribution; and on the public policy ground that criminal punishment of principal perpetrators can have a significant deterrent effect.
The cogency and force of all three of these grounds are directly related to the fact that the individuals who are targeted by the policy are the principal perpetrators, that is, the political and military leaders who plan, authorize, order, and direct genocide.
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1. "Punishing principal perpetrators of genocide is necessary in order to vindicate the rule of law at the international level". Under international law governing genocide that has developed since the Nuremberg Trials, the traditional legal defenses of sovereign immunity and official position no longer shield political and military leaders from prosecution for war crimes. A consensus has emerged around the idea that individuals, including rulers and government officials, have international legal obligations that transcend legal obligations under their own domestic law.
Moreover, member states of the United Nations have a legal duty to prevent genocide and to punish perpetrators. Despite these explicit provisions in international law, none of the principal perpetrators of the many genocides and other atrocities that have occurred since Nuremberg have actually been punished. If international law is not vindicated by being enforced, if individual leaders can violate it with impunity, if states routinely feel free to disregard their obligations, then the body of international law prohibiting genocide becomes little more than a game of half-hearted posturing.
There are some signs that this bleak picture may be changing, but whether the future will bring about a more vigorous prosecution of principal perpetrators remains doubtful. For example, in the former Yugoslavia, the ex-president of Serbia, Milosevic, and two Bosnian Serb leaders, Karadzic and Mladic, have been indicted by an International Criminal Court, but none of them has been arrested and placed on trial. In the summer of 1998 a United Nations conference in Rome adopted a statute for a permanent International Criminal Court. Unfortunately, the statute did not have the support of the United States. Moreover, the statute contains some weaknesses that will make criminal prosecution of genocide difficult.
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2. "Principal perpetrators of genocide are especially culpable and are thus deserving of severe criminal punishment in accordance with the principle of just retribution". Principal perpetrators are especially culpable and deserving of punishment for two reasons. The first reason is the central causal role they play in the perpetration of genocide. In the great majority of cases, genocide is not caused by spontaneous, short-lived pogroms; it is carried out as a matter of deliberate policy by states or revolutionary armies.
Without the instigation of political and military leaders who have at their disposal the power and authority of the institutions which they head, most genocides could not occur. Moreover, it is the planning, supervision, and direction of such leaders, using their institutional power, that explains why a campaign of genocide typically takes place throughout a large territory and over a sustained period of time, thus, producing enormously large numbers of victims. Thus, principal perpetrators are causally responsible in a very direct and personal way for the horrendous degree of evil and suffering involved in genocide.
The second reason is the fact that, unlike many minor or low-level participants, principal perpetrators pursue their genocidal policies knowingly, intentionally, and voluntarily; they have no valid excuse or mitigating circumstances that would render liability to severe criminal punishment unfair or unjust. Quite the contrary, they richly deserve severe punishment as just retribution. There is the additional practical consideration that because of their leadership role in planning and directing genocide, it is usually less difficult to prove the element of "intent to destroy a particular group in whole or in part" that is required for the crime of genocide under international law.
Finally, giving principal perpetrators their just deserts by means of criminal punishment is perhaps the most effective way to assuage the justified feelings of anger, outrage, and indignation on the part of genocide victims¿ families and communities, thus helping to prevent a potential cycle of recrimination and violent revenge.
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3. "Criminal punishment of principal perpetrators of genocide can have a significant deterrent effect". It seems very likely that some political leaders who are potential perpetrators of genocide could be deterred by a timely and credible threat of severe punishment. It is even possible that many (perhaps most) of them could be deterred if the practice of punishing them became an established feature of international law.
However, we will never know for sure unless we try, because there is only one way to make a threat of punishment truly credible and that is by actually punishing principal offenders. If and when individual states and\or the international community summon the political will and begin to punish principal perpetrators, and they do this consistently over time, eventually potential perpetrators of genocide will find the risks getting greater and greater. Potential genocides might be averted by timely official warnings by the United Nations. If an individual leader contemplating a campaign of genocide were deterred by these high risks, that particular genocide would in all likelihood not occur. Thus, an international policy of targeting principal perpetrators of genocide has enormous potential to prevent thousand of deaths.
In the course of my talk, I hope to address objections based on worries about the political feasibility of the policy, as well as objections by critics who favor truth commissions, amnesties, and other not punitive responses.
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