The International Criminal Court and Venezuela
By: Luis Gonzales Posada - 29/08/2024
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Luis Gonzalez Posada(*)
*Former Foreign Minister of Peru and President of the Congress of the Republic
The Rome Statute, which creates the International Criminal Court (ICC), establishes in its fifth article the jurisdictional competence to prosecute the authors and accomplices of crimes against humanity, and in its seventh article it considers, in that category, murders, deportations, imprisonment of citizens, torture, forced disappearance of persons, among other crimes.
Article 13 further states that the ICC is empowered to prosecute any of the crimes referred to if requested by a State Party, the United Nations Security Council or the Prosecutor of that multilateral body.
In this context, we must remember that six years ago, in 2018, a coalition of democratic nations, including Peru, Argentina, Canada, Colombia, Chile and Paraguay, demanded that the ICC investigate crimes that occurred in Venezuela since 2014, under the government of Nicolás Maduro, a period in which seven thousand people were murdered according to the report of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Therefore, today, when repression is intensifying, would be a magnificent opportunity for our country, which signed the Rome Statute on December 7, 2000 and deposited its instrument of ratification on November 10, 2001, to file a complaint with the ICC for the brutal repression of the Chavista government against citizens who are peacefully protesting against the corrupt fraud of July 28, the date on which its presidential candidate, Nicolás Maduro, lost by 4 million votes.
So far, 27 people have been killed by the regime's security forces, including several minors, 500 have been injured by clubs, pellets and bullets, and at least 2,400 are in prison, without a court order or right to defense.
It is time to stop the barbaric barracks of Chavismo, which has imposed a regime of terror in the homeland of Bolívar, causing the exodus of 8 million human beings, which will increase by several million more given the helpless situation in which the population finds itself.
The great popular mobilizations in Venezuela and 300 cities around the world are not enough, nor is the admirable civic epic of the social democratic leader, Maria Corina Machado, an example of firmness and perseverance, who should receive the Nobel Peace Prize.
It is necessary to demonstrate that instruments of international justice, such as the ICC, are not bureaucratic entities indifferent to human suffering, but rather living organisms that act firmly to protect the life and dignity of those who are the object of infamous abuses.
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