International Criminal Law Practitioner Library: Volume 2, Elements of Crimes under
International criminal law has developed substantially in the past two decades largely due to the creation of the ad hoc Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda and the International Criminal Court. Although much attention has been devoted to the International Criminal Court (ICC) since 1998, on the ground that it is a truly international tribunal, international criminal law has developed mainly through the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).
Unlike the ICC, which at the time of writing has delivered few judgments, the ad hoc Tribunals have been operating actively as criminal law tribunals for more than a decade. Lengthy, carefully researched, and thoroughly reasoned judgments have been handed down by judges from different countries with different judicial experience.
These judgments have created a new international or transnational criminal law that draws on the experience of the Nuremberg and Tokyo Tribunals and national courts, and successfully integrates national and international criminal law, humanitarian law and human rights law. The ICTY and ICTR have succeeded in developing both procedural law and substantive international criminal law. A host of orders have been given on questions of procedure designed to ensure that due process of law is respected; and many judgments have been rendered on questions of substantive law that advance international criminal justice.
The first two volumes of the International Criminal Law Practitioner Library, written by three young international criminal lawyers who have all worked in the ICTY and been directly involved in the evolution of the law before this tribunal, deal largely with issues of substantive law. Volume I examined the law of individual criminal responsibility and focused on joint criminal enterprise, superior orders, aiding and abetting, and the planning and instigation of international crime.
Volume II – Elements of Crimes Under International Law –
examines the jurisprudence of the core crimes of international criminal law: genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes, and the subject of cumulative convictions and sentencing. Although the ICTY and ICTR provide much of the
jurisprudence described in the present volume, the jurisprudence of other tribunals
is not ignored. The law of Nuremberg and Tokyo features prominently, and the law
and structure of other international and internationalised tribunals – the Special
Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL), the Special Panels for Serious Crimes in East Timor
(SPSC), the Supreme Iraqi Criminal Tribunal (SICT), the Extraordinary Chambers
of the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) and, of course, the International Criminal Court –
are also examined.
