ADDRESS BY EMMA BONINO (Commissioner for Humanitarian Affairs)

on behalf of the European Commission

It is a pleasure to be here today to address such a distinguished audience; and it is a privilege to do so at the opening of a Diplomatic Conference which will have, I hope, a place in the history of International Justice and Cooperation.

Our world is changing - but not for the better.

We have always known that peace and security can never be taken for granted. Yet, with the end of the Cold War era, many thought that war could hopefully become a residuary, painful exception in international relations. Instead, it has come back at a gallop into the history of the late twentieth century.

Worse even: war, warriors and warmongers appear to have recovered a dignity, sometime a perverse popular appeal which we thought was lost forever; whereas violence and civilian victims thereof are becoming a sad fact of life. Many of the conflicts we see today may well be local, without implications for geopolitics on a global scale. What is worrying about them is that they too often signal a return to barbarity.

In fact, war itself is changing. Traditional conflicts between national armies have been replaced by the bloodiest internal and ethnic conflicts, where civilians are not accidental casualties, but the primary target of attacks; where crimes against humanity and even genocide are not just a means but a purpose of the conflict; where the minimum standards of humanity that all nations had agreed would always apply - the body of conventions known as "International humanitarian law" - are violated as a policy, not by accident.

Genocide, crimes against humanity, serious war crimes - and the impunity enjoyed by those responsible - create a vicious spiral of violence-and-revenge that eventually threatens peace and security.

Time has come to break the cycle of violence, to put an end to impunity, and to demonstrate the international community's resolve to assert the primacy of the rule of law. This Diplomatic Conference, itself the culmination of many months of negotiations, is called upon to deliver on these daunting tasks - drawing, as appropriate, on the experience gained from the establishment of the ad hoc Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda.

I have been, throughout my political career, a restless supporter of International Justice. As such, I have also unambiguously supported the existing ad hoc Tribunals; and the European Community budget, has generously financed their structures - and their functioning.

But I am painfully aware of the difficulties those Tribunals have faced, as well as of the risks involved in a further proliferation of "special" courts. Let us face it: we can't carry on establishing judicial structures that are not only "ad hoc", but also "post hoc".

What we need instead, as highlighted in the European Union's statement, is a permanent Court structure, with a standing mandate and universal rules. Which would also constitute a powerful and credible deterrent against crimes - and criminals - that the international community shall no longer tolerate.

In order to achieve this objective, we will need, first of all, a Court with jurisdiction over a core group of crimes: genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, including those committed in the course of civil wars and other internal conflicts.

Secondly, we need a Court with a constructive relationship with other international institutions, and with the U.N. Security Council in particular. A number of options are on the table for discussion here in Rome and I hope that your patience and negotiating skill will enable the Conference to find imaginative solutions, paving the way to the establishment of a Court in which people can trust.

Thirdly, and perhaps most important, the Court should have a strong, effective, highly qualified prosecutor, independent of governments.

Finally, the Court should have adequate procedures to ensure its fair and effective operation, to safeguard the rights of the accused and to ease the giving of evidence of the victims. In this context it is important for me to underline that there will be no provision, in the statute of the Court, contemplating the death penalty.

To establish such a far-reaching and unprecedented court before the end of the century is a task of gargantuan proportion. But we ought to keep in mind this symbolic deadline. Because the end of this century will also mark the end of a seemingly endless chain of horrors, including two world wars; several genocides; mass starvation; and a continuous proliferation of refugee and displaced populations around the world.

With this in mind, throught the European Community budget, in the past months several projects were financed intended to raise civil society's awareness of the need for a Permanent Court; and has likewise provided a contribution to the UN Trust Fund to enhance participation of least developed countries to the Conference.

This conference must succeed.

We owe it to too many victims, of too many abject crimes.

We owe it to the future generations, which I hope will be less tolerant than we have been vis à vis these crimes and their perpetrators.

And we owe it to public opinion worldwide, to the "global village" which is watching us here today.

It is up to us to show that international co-operation can deal successfully also with moral issues; and that wider support for international institutions is indeed well placed, and well deserved.

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