NAIROBI – The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor will request an investigation into suspected crimes against humanity committed during Kenya’s post-election violence in 2008.
The decision by Luis Moreno-Ocampo, which was announced during a visit to Kenya yesterday, is the start of a process that could end with influential politicians being brought to court in The Hague.
Mr Moreno-Ocampo met President Mwai Kibaki and prime minister Raila Odinga yesterday and the prosecutor’s statement means the Kenyan leaders decided against referring the case to the court themselves.
Mr Moreno-Ocampo told a news conference he would ask ICC pre-trial judges in December to let him start an investigation, the route he has to follow if a government chooses not to refer suspected crimes committed in its country to the court.
Ethnic clashes after a disputed presidential election killed at least 1,300 people and uprooted more than 300,000.
I consider the crimes committed in Kenya were crimes against humanity, therefore the gravity is there. So therefore I should proceed, Mr Moreno-Ocampo told a joint news conference with Mr Kibaki and Mr Odinga in the capital, Nairobi.
Kenya had promised to deal with the instigators of violence. But numerous attempts to kick-start the process have floundered and many Kenyans doubt if powerful individuals will be arrested and charged because of perceived impunity among politicians.
During a visit to Kenya in October, crisis mediator Kofi Annan warned that unless the architects of last year’s killings were brought to book, there was a serious risk violence would erupt again at the next presidential election in 2012.
Mr Annan handed over a list of the main suspects to Mr Moreno-Ocampo in July. Political sources say it names cabinet ministers, members of parliament and businessmen. Mr Moreno-Ocampo now plans to investigate some of them.
“His coming shows that the process is progressing to the next level. We are in the global justice system and there is no going back,” said Robert Shaw, a Nairobi-based analyst.
“This goes beyond carting a few people off to The Hague. It might have a cathartic influence on the political system ... sort of like lancing a boil,” he said.
Mr Kibaki and Mr Odinga said in a joint statement that Kenya remained committed to co-operating with the ICC and to setting up a local judicial mechanism to prosecute violence suspects.
“We are ready to work with his court so that we don’t see a repeat of what we saw last year,” Mr Odinga said.
The problem for Kenya’s leaders is that they were rivals for the presidency. The killing started after the electoral commission declared Mr Kibaki the winner, and Mr Odinga cried foul.
If they were seen to be the ones giving up former party allies accused of mobilising ethnic militias, the coalition could fall apart.
“The problem is that the people who funded the turmoil are in power now. I’d rather we get an independent body to oversee this,” said Bernard Gitau (50), who is living in a camp in the Rift Valley housing 500 families uprooted by the violence. – (Reuters)