African Leaders Refuse To Hand Over Alleged War Criminal Bashir

The African Union (A.U.) has announced that it will not cooperate with the International Criminal Court (ICC’s) demand to extradite Sudanese president Omar Hassan Al Bashir. Bashir was indicted by the ICC for war crimes in March.

The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) reported in a news bulletin that the summit, meeting in Sirte under the chairmanship of Libyan leader Muammar Ghaddafi, has approved a resolution saying it will not help arrest or extradite Bashir, nor aid in his transfer to the court’s prison in The Hague. Meanwhile ABC News said Sudan’s minister of state for foreign affairs, Alsamani al-Wasila, was delighted with the result:

The resolution was very clear - all Africa member countries should not cooperate with the ICC regarding this indictment.

Critics of the ICC in Africa have long argued that it is a western institution and only targets African leaders, pointing to alleged international law violations by the U.S. and Britain, saying the ICC has taken no action against western leaders. The SABC said 30 member states out of the A.U.’s 53 are signatories to the ICC convention, and so should be bound to arrest and extradite Bashir. The new resolution contradicts this. Human rights organisations say the A.U. is siding with a dictator against his victims and Amnesty International describes the decision as showing disdain for the suffering of the people of Darfur.