توضیح

یادداشت: عنوان فارسی: کثرت گرایی حقوقی، دفاعیات فرهنگی و سنت حقوقی اسلامی (شریعت) به سوی یک دادگاه کیفری بین المللی حقیقی.
Much like the rest of international law, international criminal law has been shaped by the preferences of the major powers, their intellectual traditions and legal scholarship, leading to the neglect of concepts of crime and justice of other cultures. This has proven to be a major hindrance when judges are faced with defendants from different legal traditions and world views, yet their application of the provision of international law largely remains free from their considerations, including at the International Criminal Court (ICC). This is despite Article 21 of the Rome Statute providing the latter with the ability to interpret the Statute in accordance with general principles of law derived from national laws of legal systems of the world including the national laws of States that would normally exercise jurisdiction over the crime.
Utilizing a cultural relativism approach can facilitate the Court’s proper engagement with legal pluralism by allowing it to acknowledge and understand the broader socio-cultural context in which the defendant is accused of committing international crimes. This article provides a critique of the ICC’s lack of engagement with the principles of legal pluralism and cultural relativism and argues that this prevents it from becoming a truly universal international criminal court. It further proposes an alternative approach for the Court to adopt when dealing with Muslim defendants and the application of Islamic law.
Our analysis of the case studies demonstrates that it is essential that international judges at the ICC embrace cultural diversity in their interpretation of the provisions of the Rome Statute so that it is the accused individual, and not his culture or religion, that is in the dock. In order to achieve this, we urge the Assembly of States Parties to take the necessary actions to set out a designated training curricula to educate judges before their appointment on matters related to legal pluralism and cultural relativism. We submitted that this judicial training is crucial to the efficient and impartial administration of international criminal justice, and ultimately to the ICC’s legitimacy.