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    "id": 388958,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/388958/?format=api",
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    "content": "“The Court has jurisdiction only with respect to crimes committed after the entry into force of this Statute.” It means that all the crimes and other things that were done to us at that time were barred by the Rome Statute and, therefore, were not subject to the ICC; and that worries me tremendously. Mr. Speaker, Sir, at one point in time in our lives when the Rome Statute was being canvassed, if you recall because I do, the American Government went around the whole world entreating the world under Article 98, not to allow the articles mentioned in Article 98. They came to Kenya, if you can recall, and Kenya was very strong and adamant on that point, and it rejected the American request. But the question that we must ask ourselves is: Why did the United States of America, right from the inception, decline to accede to the Rome Statute? Why did it also say that if any state should arrest an American involved in war crimes or otherwise, it would be an act of war against the American Government? I submit that the Americans were talking about the sovereignty of the country and they knew the things that could happen and that is the reason they were so adamant about the Rome Statute. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I was the Ambassador to Belgium for three-and-a-half years, and the issue we are discussing now came before all the embassies in Europe and America, and these issues were discussed when we were working so hard to have the cases deferred back to Kenya. It was because when Kofi Anan was here after the violence of 2008, certain conditions were made; among them was what came to be called Agenda Item No.4. Our country, pursuant to the agreements that were reached then, worked very hard towards dealing with and attaining the matters contained in Agenda Item No.4. Amongst these was the Constitution that guarantees the rights of persons, a reformed Judiciary and also there was the issue of governance. We, as a country, have worked very hard towards attaining all these issues. We have a new Judiciary, we have a Supreme Court that came out very strongly after the elections of 2013 and made a decision that was accepted by both the parties. The reason for this is that all the parties agreed that we have institutions and that we must continue to nurture them; and we must respect our institutions as much as we can. If we do not support our institutions, we are building them for nothing. If we do not build these institutions, we shall never be able to adequately deal with issues of governance. Mr. Speaker, Sir, Article 16 of The Rome Statute talks about deferral of cases. Sen. (Dr.) Khalwale has referred to it. He has also referred to Chapter 7 of the United Nations (UN) Charter. These are important provisions because the deferral of these cases can be done and an application for them can be made at any point – even now after the cases have commenced. The truth of the matter is that we, as a nation, have made an application and very impassioned pleas for deferral of these cases, actually, on more than one occasion. But the truth of this is that our application for deferral has never been refused; the truth is that it has never been heard. The UN Security Council decided as if we did not have a matter to bring before them, and did not even open the doors for us to state our case. It was an important case for deferral, and I stand here in support of this Motion the way it is framed; that our Government must continue to do what is best for our The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}