As the coordinator of the Arab Coalition for the International Criminal Court, the Arab Center for the Independence of the Judiciary and the Legal Profession urges the Sudanese government and the governments of Arab countries to provide full cooperation to the International Criminal Court and to provide support for its role and competence in the prosecution and the accountability of those involved in committing the most serious crimes such as the crime of aggression, genocide , war crimes and crimes against humanity.

ACIJLP points out that issuing a second arrest warrant on July 12th 2010, against the Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir for genocide crimes in the Darfur region, requires the Sudanese government to hand over President Omar al-Bashir to the International Criminal Court to be subjected to a fair trial during which he will have the chance to refute the charges against him.

Worth mentioning that the Pre-Trial Chamber I of the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued this warrant of arrest against the President Al Bashir, considering that there are reasonable grounds to believe him responsible for three counts of genocide committed against the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa ethnic groups, that include: genocide by killing, genocide by causing serious bodily or mental harm and genocide by deliberately inflicting on each target group conditions of life calculated to bring about the group’s physical destruction.

It should be noted also that this second arrest warrant does not replace or revoke in any respect the first warrant of arrest that was issued against Mr Al Bashir on 4 March, 2009, the Chamber considered that there are reasonable grounds to believe that Mr Al Bashir is criminally responsible for crimes against humanity and rejected the Prosecutor’s application in respect of the crime of genocide. On 6 July, 2009, the Prosecutor filed an appeal against this decision.

On 3 February, 2010, the Appeals Chamber rendered its judgment on the Prosecutor’s appeal , reversing, by unanimous decision, Pre-Trial Chamber I’s decision of 4 March, 2009, to the extent that Pre-Trial Chamber I decided ‘not to issue a warrant of arrest in respect of the charge of genocide in view of an erroneous standard of proof’. The Appeals Chamber directed the Pre-Trial Chamber to decide anew whether or not the arrest warrant should be extended to cover the charge of genocide. Pre-Trial Chamber I concluded today that there are reasonable grounds to believe that Mr Al Bashir acted with specific intent to destroy in part the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa ethnic groups.

Pre-Trial Chamber I requests the Registrar of the Court to prepare a supplementary request for co-operation seeking the arrest and surrender of Mr Al Bashir for the counts contained in both the first and the second warrant of arrest, and transmit such a request to the competent Sudanese authorities, to all States Parties to the Rome Statute, and to all the United Nations Security Council members that are not States Parties to the Statute.

ACIJLP calls upon the Sudanese Government and governments of Arab countries to provide support for the role of the ICC; as it is the only permanent international court established with the mission to help put an end to impunity for the perpetrators of the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole