ANALYSIS:The International Criminal Court can boost its reputation by prosecuting Gadafy, writes CHRISTOPHER STEPHENin Benghazi
CHIEF PROSECUTOR Luis Ocampo wore a black suit and tie to make his announcement yesterday that he wanted Muammar Gadafy tried for crimes against humanity.
Prosecutors have been racing against time these past weeks to get an indictment filed before the Libyan dictator decided to take up the offers of immunity flagged by the United States, Britain and Italy.
For all the enthusiasm of the Argentine prosecutor to make Gadafy, his son Saif al-Islam and intelligence chief Abdullah Senussi answer for their crimes, western diplomats fear it will choke off chances of any negotiated end to the war.
Hardly had the UN Security Council ordered the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate Libya in late February than individual member states were inviting Gadafy to make a dignified exit, with immunity hinted at in return for an early end to the war.
With the request for indictments issued in The Hague, Ocampo will be confident this escape hatch has been firmly nailed shut. No western leader will be comfortable supporting a graceful exile for a man now charged with a horrendous litany of crimes.
While those states yet to join the ICC can still offer Gadafy a bolt-hole, they know they would now risk opprobrium for doing so, with little in the way of benefits as the UN has frozen his billions of dollars of assets.
How realistic the option of exile was is unclear, not least because a state would need to accept not just the erratic colonel but four of his sons – Ocampo is likely to charge three more with war crimes in the coming months – plus their entourages.
Now Gadafy has no choice but to fight it out. One western diplomat complained to me recently that more people will die as a result: Immunity and exile might have brought a stop to the daily toll of civilians bombarded in Misrata.
Instead, the war will grind on; the rebels, denied the chance to buy heavy weapons by a UN arms embargo, will continue to rely on Nato blasting them a bloody path to the gates of Tripoli.
But for Ocampo, this indictment is a chance to redeem himself: In seven years as chief prosecutor of a court with a hundred million dollar budget and 560 employees, he has yet to convict anyone of anything.
He has only a handful of cases on trial and just over a dozen indictments, not much to show for so much effort.
The Libya case offers him a chance to change the equation: The case is strong, the horror unfolding right in front of his investigators.
The chief prosecutor would not be drawn on the delicate question of whether an immunity deal would perhaps save lives.
If cornered, he might well reply, as do Libyans here on the streets of Benghazi, that this dictator must be made to pay for his crimes.
Nobody in those states advocating immunity for the colonel would seriously suggest their own justice systems should offer immunity for murderers who stop murdering or bank robbers who agree to stop robbing banks. Gadafy will likely answer for his crimes, unless vengeful rebels get to him first.
And maybe – although it is a big maybe – a future dictator in a future war will think twice about committing similar butchery.