Legal aspects of international political relations

In 2004, the International Criminal Court (ICC), established by the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, focused on meeting its primary objective of becoming an independent and credible institution of international criminal justice. Significant developments included the adoption in May of the Regulations of the Court and the creation of an operational Office of the Prosecutor. In July, the Prosecutor opened the first ICC investigations, which concerned alleged crimes falling within the Court’s jurisdiction committed in the territory of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. On 4 October, the Relationship Agreement between ICC and the United Nations, which set out a legal framework for their cooperation in the effective discharge of their respective responsibilities, entered into force. In December, the General Assembly called on States not yet parties to the Rome Statute to consider acceding to it. In other action, the Assembly adopted the United Nations Convention on Jurisdictional Immunities of States and Their Property, the draft of which had been prepared by the Ad Hoc Committee established in 2000 to elaborate the Convention.

Related Subject(s): United Nations