23rd Amendment International Criminal Court/ Arguments Against

The 23rd Amendment of the Constitution Bill, 2001 proposes to amend the Irish Constitution to allow Ireland to ratify the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court . The function of the Court is to try, in certain defined circumstances, persons charged with genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and aggression.

This statement of the main arguments for and against this proposal is published by the Referendum Commission having regard to submissions made to it by the public in response to advertisements.

The arguments should be read in conjunction with the earlier explanatory leaflets published by, and available from, the Referendum Commission .

The Commission expresses no opinion as to the comparative merits of these arguments and there is no significance in the order in which they are printed.

Consider them and decide before you vote on the 7th June.


Arguments against

You should vote NO to this proposal because:

There is no need for a permanent international institution of this nature. Justice has been effectively administered by special courts in Nuremberg and Tokyo, and in the ad hoc tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda. A permanent court would not have the flexibility which the ad hoc courts have.

There can be no democratic mandate for this court as it has only so far been ratified by small countries. The two countries with the largest populations, China and India, have not ratified it and don't intend to. It will not be ratified by the USA.

It is likely that this Court will only deal with the defeated, as winners are never taken to task for their crimes.

The UN is manipulated by non-elected and unaccountable non-governmental organisations and is dominated by western liberal and secular thinking and so is not a suitable institution for dispensing criminal justice.

The Court is likely to be dependent on additional funding supplied by wealthy organisations and individuals and, accordingly, may be influenced by their particular agendas.

There are many loose, imprecise words in the Statute and these are likely to be interpreted in unforeseen ways. "Crimes against humanity" is a catch all phrase which is capable of many interpretations. For example, the crime of "forced pregnancy" could possibly be interpreted to support the availability of abortion.

The Court will remove responsibility from our courts and legislature to decide on matters in our own national interest. We should retain the power to administer criminal justice in our own state.

The Court will not be accountable to anyone.

Irish peacekeeping forces could find themselves before the Court if problems arose in their mission.