July 14, 2008 ... Who is afraid of the ICC?

Over years the conflict in Darfur has led to the deaths of over 300,000.0 and the displacement of up to three-million persons. However, because of Human Rights' groups and certain governments to overestimate for dramatic effect, as happened over Iraq, these figures must be taken with some degree of skepticism. Nevertheless, it can be safely said, too many Darfur an have suffered needlessly at the hands of their tribal counterparts, the Sudanese government and its regional allies, such as the Janjaweed militia.

International outcries by governments, the UN, Hollywood actors including the threat of sanctions, etc., have had almost zero impact on the Sudanese governments' policies. But immediately upon the expectation that Luis Moreno-Ocampo will announce ICC indictments, the Sudanese government with President Omar al-Beshir in the vanguard have leapt into action and threatened bloody retribution if the indictments are proceeded with, and an emergency Arab League meeting has been called for. All this action in under 24 Hrs. Events move swiftly when a leadership too preoccupied with teddy bears is not looking forward to joining their dear-old-friend President Charles Taylor, in the Hague.

Given that the ICC is held in such high regard by leaders such as these, it must surely suggest that their Zimbabwean counterparts might also be less 'optimistic', 'upbeat' about their futures, if similar indictments were to be put in train. After all, President Saddam Hussein was successfully prosecuted--by an Iraqi court--over the murder of about 140 persons in an Iraqi village. So prosecuting President Robert Mugabe and 13 of his closest colleagues over an estimated 20,000.0 deaths in Matabeleland in the 1980s, and over a hundred MDC supporters during the 2008 Presidential election rerun, should be not too difficult.