The International Criminal Court (ICC) opened in 2002 in The Hague, in the Netherlands, with a mission to investigate and bring to trial individuals charged with the gravest crimes when the countries involved did not have the commitment or the capacity to bring them to justice themselves. Here is an animation explaining how the ICC works. VIDEOGRAPHIC
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00:00The International Criminal Court opened in 2002 in The Hague in the Netherlands.
00:11With a mission to investigate and bring to trial individuals charged with the gravest
00:15crimes when the countries involved did not have the commitment or the capacity to bring
00:20them to justice themselves.
00:22The ICC takes on cases involving four types of crimes.
00:27Cases of aggression by one country against another, war crimes, crimes against humanity
00:37and genocide.
00:40It is composed of 18 judges, senior judicial officers and lawyers elected from the member
00:46countries with a mandate of nine years.
00:48Its most important section is the Office of the Prosecutor, which conducts investigations
00:53and prosecutions.
00:56Once an investigation is complete and suspects arrested, the court can, in theory, organise
01:01a trial and sentence those found guilty.
01:04However, in reality, the ICC conducts its mission under extremely difficult conditions.
01:10124 countries are members of the court, but dozens of others don't recognise it, notably
01:15the United States, China, Russia and Israel.
01:22Some member states don't always cooperate, depending on the political context.
01:27The investigators therefore lack the means to do their work.
01:30Witnesses can be put under pressure.
01:33An arresting suspect is often a challenge because the ICC does not have its own police
01:38force.
01:39It is thus dependent on the goodwill of the member states.
01:42If a suspect is in the territory of a country which doesn't recognise the authority of the
01:46court, there is virtually no chance of the person being arrested.
01:50And some member countries don't honour their obligation to arrest suspects.
01:55These factors explain, in part, the mixed results of the ICC.
01:59Of some 30 cases launched since its creation, nearly half are still ongoing, essentially
02:05because the suspects are still at large.
02:08Less than half of the arrest warrants issued since 2002 have been executed.
02:14So in the final analysis, the court's rate of conviction is low.
02:18Over some 20 years, it has found 11 accused, all of them African, guilty, with four others
02:24acquitted.