Balancing the Interests of Justice: The Case of Afghanistan in The International Criminal Court (ICC)

Abstract

The interests of justice are criteria of the requirements under Article 53 of the Rome Statute to open a formal investigation of a case. However, it can be misinterpreted due to its lack of clear scopes and standards. The Afghanistan case highlighted this obscurity when The Pre-Trial Chamber (PTC) decided that the case should not proceed due to the interests of justice despite lacking negative determination from the Prosecutor, and the Appeals Chamber (AC) overturned this decision by excluding the interests of justice from proprio motu cases. This article verifies the limitations of the criteria in international criminal law (ICL) through the interpretation of the Rome Statute. In addition, it includes the other ICC’s supporting documents and the application to previous cases. This study is of the position that, in the Afghanistan decision, the PTC had overstepped their authority and made an arbitrary decision. The AC had misinterpreted the conjunction between Article 53(3) and Article 15(4) by excluding requirements under Article 53 from proprio motu cases. Based on the opinion, the interpretation on the interests of justice to ensure the criteria still valid as a balancing mechanism under the Rome Statute is very urgent.