Thailand to back International Criminal Court

BANGKOK, June 12

Thailand will sign the UN's Rome Statute on setting up an International

Criminal Court (ICC) by the end of this year, making it the first Southeast

Asian country to do so, the deputy foreign minister said Monday.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sukhumbhand Paribatra said the Association of

Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) had so far failed to coordinate on the

issue of a permanent court, but Thailand would lead by example.

"The question of the merit of the Rome Statute is undebatable as far as we

are concerned," Sukhumbhand said in a keynote speech opening the first

Asian workshop to promote the ICC attended by some 60 civil servants and

NGO members from around the region.

Sukhumbhand said Thailand would sign before the closing date set by the UN

at 31 December. "We would have to sign by the 31st of December, 2000. We

will sign it," he said.

"We need to get our own house in order where the Rome Statute is concerned

before we can think of encouraging others."

Just four countries from Asia out of more than 90 world-wide have signed

onto the 1998 Rome Statute: South Korea, Bangladesh, Kyrgyzstan and

Tajikistan.

Only 10 nations -- Tajikistan the only one from Asia -- have so far

ratified the statute.

At least 60 nations must ratify it for the statute to take effect.

"Unfortunately there has not been much coordination among the ASEAN

countries on this matter. At present it seems to be a matter of national

conscience," Sukhumbhand said.

He said that nations in the region must realise that globalisation has made

the issue of national sovereignty an invalid excuse for blocking the

formation of an international court.

"The ICC is seen by many as a threat to national sovereignty ... but I

believe that such a perception is no longer valid," he said.

Sukhumbhand quoted United Nations secretary general Kofi

Annan saying: "No government has the right to hide behind national

sovereignty in order to violate the human rights and fundamental freedoms

of the people."

He said Thailand bore a tremendous burden in terms of refugees from turmoil

in neighbouring states.

"With traditional responsibilities in shouldering refugees and displaced

persons from neighbouring countries, Thailand seeks the end of the human

tragedies in this region and elsewhere," he said.

Thailand is home to more than 100,000 displaced persons who have fled

oppression and fighting in neighbouring Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia.

"The task is tremendous, but the most difficult part about this is to bear

witness to the decline of the human spirit of those people who have been

forced to live away from their homes and their loved ones."

"In the 1970s the world witnessed the genocide committed by the Khmer

Rouge, the legacy of which still leaves traces in that society ... Never

again do we wish to see such atrocities."

After a year-long stalemate, Cambodia and the UN last month reached an

agreement to hold a joint trial of surviving Khmer Rouge leaders blamed for

the deaths of nearly two million people.

Two adhoc international war crime tribunals are already operating -- one

based in the Netherlands and focusing on atrocities committed in Bosnia and

a similar one in Tanzania focussing on the Rwandan genocide.

The ICC seeks jurisdiction over citizens of all countries, not just parties

to the treaty. The idea has been opposed by the United States, along with

China, Libya, Iraq and Israel.