Israel – Gaza: Who is Karim Khan and why is the ICC prosecutor who requested arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Hamas leaders controversial

Kareem Khan can say he knows both sides of the fence.

The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), who has requested arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas leaders, once defended controversial individuals who are now accused of those crimes.

“I don’t see any difference between prosecuting a case and defending an accused,” he said shortly after being elected to a nine-year term starting in 2021.

For the British, the law is, after all, the law, and experience on both sides keeps you “grounded” and also helps you avoid destructive thoughts such as “thinking that the defense lawyer is the devil incarnate or as , a prosecutor, is doing a ‘God’s work,'” he then admitted to the exclusive publication Jurisdiction,

KHAN This week has shown that he’s not afraid to get involved in some of the world’s most controversial cases.

Combative, charismatic and, according to some, with a touch of arrogance, Karim Khan drew criticism from Israel and its allies, including the United States and the United Kingdom, for the first time placing an Israeli ruler in the same category as Omar. Is of. Bashir, Vladimir Putin or Joseph Kony: accused of war crimes.

His decision, on which a group of ICC investigating judges will now have to rule to determine whether the evidence supports an arrest warrant, has also drawn threats.

He himself explained in an interview with CNN that when he was investigating to make a case against Netanyahu, some “elected leaders” contacted him and were very direct in their comments: “This court is made for Africa and for thugs like Putin”Khan claimed a representative, whose identity he did not disclose, told him.

A group of US Republican senators even sent him a public letter threatening to ban him and his family from entering the country if the investigation continued.”“you have been warned”The letter ended.

But Khan did not back down.

During the announcement of his decision last Monday, the ICC Chief Prosecutor did not hesitate to respond to “attempts to obstruct, intimidate or improperly influence officials” of the Court and warned that if such behavior continued His office “will not hesitate to take action”.

Karim Khan was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, on 30 March 1970. Born to a Pakistani father and a British mother, Khan became interested in humanitarian law from a young age, in part due to his volunteer work with the Ahmadiyya Community, a persecuted branch of Islam to which he belongs.

He studied law at the prestigious King’s College, London and later worked in the Attorney General’s Office and from there moved into international justice.

He served as both defense counsel and prosecutor before various international courts, including Criminal Courts for the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Lebanon and Sierra Leone,

Among his clients were controversial figures such as Saif al Islam, the son of former Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi, or Charles Taylor, the former president of Liberia accused of war crimes.

He also defended Kenya’s then-Deputy President William Ruto, who was accused of inciting post-election violence in 2007 that left over 1,200 people dead, and even asked the court to dismiss the case.

The fact that Kenya was subsequently one of the countries that promoted its candidacy to the ICC cast some doubts on the process.

Khan was appointed as a special advisor by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in 2018 Head of the team in charge of investigating crimes committed by the Islamic State group in Iraq,

On February 12, 2021, Khan was elected ICC Chief Prosecutor for a 9-year term and was sworn in on June 16, 2021.

He is the third prosecutor in the history of the ICC, established in July 2002.

The British lawyer replaced Gambian judge Fatou Bensouda, against whom then-US President Donald Trump’s government had imposed sanctions over her decision to investigate possible war crimes by US troops in Afghanistan.

The case began in 2020 and sought to investigate possible war crimes committed not only by US troops in the Central Asian country, but also the Taliban and Afghan armed forces.

The response of then US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was that the ICC was a “totally broken and corrupt institution”.

However, Washington lifted these sanctions in April 2021, when it was already known that Khan would replace Bensouda, although she had not yet taken office.

When, months later, Karim Khan announces he is withdrawing the United States from the Afghanistan investigation The decision to focus on the actions of the Taliban and Islamic State faced criticism from human rights organizations.

Then some people said that Karim Khan He was following his master’s voice“, Thomas Werfus, President of the Association of International Criminal Court Journalists, who has been following information about the Hague courts daily for decades, analyzes for BBC Mundo.

Khan was selected for the post with the support of his country, the United Kingdom, and, it was said, with the approval of the United States and Israel, despite not being signatory countries to the Rome Statute, which gave rise to the ICC. .

“That’s why Many people thought he was just doing what his American friends wanted, Because there was no reason not to continue investigating the crimes of American troops in Afghanistan, which, as we know from human rights organizations, are horrific,” recalls Werfus.

However, “now in this situation in Palestine we see that he is not following the voice of his master,” and is demonstrating more confidence in himself and his work, the veteran journalist says.

The issue of the Palestinian territories is, of course, one of the issues for which Khan has received criticism since his appointment.

His predecessor decided in 2019 that there was a reasonable basis to open an investigation into possible war crimes committed in the Palestinian territories by members of the Israeli military, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups.

The ICC gave it the green light in 2021, noting that the court could exercise its jurisdiction over the Palestinian territories.

Among other things, the prosecutor wanted to investigate the establishment of illegal settlements in the West Bank and violations of the Geneva Convention during the 2014 Gaza war, in which Israel was accused of attacking Red Cross facilities and Hamas and other militias of using civilians as human shields.

However, once Karim Khan took overthe investigation seemed to be stalledThe disappointment of many human rights groups who had been trying for years to bring this case to international justice.

His visit to Israel following the Hamas attacks on October 7, which sparked the current Gaza war, drew criticism from those who saw bias towards the Israeli side, while lagging behind investigation of events in the Palestinian territories.

Shortly after, he visited the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt, where humanitarian aid was accumulating due to the blockade imposed by Israel on the Strip.

Khan then warned that blocking the passage of aid to the people of Gaza could be a crime under the jurisdiction of the ICC.

After seven months, the warning has come trueAnd Khan has accused Netanyahu and his defense minister, Yoav Galant, of, among other things, instigating famine as a method of war and deliberately inflicting great suffering on the Gaza population.

They have also requested arrest warrants for three Hamas leaders: Yahya Sinwar, who heads the group in Gaza, as well as leaders Ismail Haniya and Mohammed al-Masri.

He accuses them all of being responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity, for acts committed on and after October 7, such as destruction, murder, hostage-taking or rape.

Netanyahu’s arrest warrant is the second issued by the ICC’s chief prosecutor against an international leader in more than a year, although the Israeli prime minister has not yet been confirmed by the court’s judges.

In March 2023, the criminal court in The Hague Ordered the arrest of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Admitting that he is responsible for war crimes for the illegal deportation of children from Ukraine to Russia.

The ICC also issued an arrest warrant for Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, the Russian Commissioner for Children’s Rights.

Russia, like the US, Israel or China, is not a signatory to the Rome Statute, which formally established the International Criminal Court, so the court cannot exercise jurisdiction on its own territory and can only arrest Putin – or Netanyahu. If the ICC ultimately issues an arrest. Warrant – if you travel to a signatory country.

However, Russia, Israel and the Palestinian territories are not the only open cases currently being investigated by the International Criminal Court.

Karim Khan announced the opening of a preliminary investigation into possible crimes against humanity by authorities of Nicolas Maduro’s government in the repression of Venezuelan opposition protests in November 2021.

Venezuela is the only country in Latin America that has an open investigation by the ICC.

According to Khan, there are “reasonable grounds” to trust government and military officials They carried out enforced disappearances, extrajudicial executions, arbitrary detentions, and torture of dissidents. During the 2017 protests, in which 125 people were killed.

The Maduro government presented an appeal to the ICC in which it demanded that the progress of the investigation against him be stopped.

The appeal judges unanimously dismissed all charges in the appeal last March and gave the ICC Prosecutor’s Office the green light to reopen the abuse investigation.

The Venezuelan government criticized the decision and believed that “it responds to the intention Using the international criminal justice system for political purposes“All this is based on allegations of alleged crimes against humanity that never occurred.”

In any case, Khan’s recent words before the Venezuelan Parliament, where he visited last April, summarize well his work, whether in Russia, Venezuela, Israel or the Palestinian territories: “My work Don’t want to be popular and I’m sure I’m not going to be. my job is to enforce the law,

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