Transnational Crimes, Terrorism and Torture

Abstract

Introduction Overview To focus only on the ‘core crimes’ and their prosecution would be to ignore a substantial area of criminal law with international implications; there are other crimes of international concern which have a huge impact on global economic development and on people’s general welfare. Crimes which are the subject of international suppression conventions, but for which there is as yet no international criminal jurisdiction, are the focus of this chapter. They are here termed ‘transnational crimes’. These are crimes which have actual or potential transboundary effects. We include torture in this chapter because, although it does not have a cross-border element, it is dealt with by the international community in the same way as transnational crimes properly so-called. The prevention and punishment of transnational crimes requires cooperation among governments and among law enforcement agencies. A growing number of agreements are being concluded to provide for this in relation to such crimes as drugs trafficking, piracy, slavery, terrorism offences, torture, apartheid, enforced disappearances, corruption, transnational organized crime including people trafficking, smuggling migrants and illegal arms trafficking. Some of these are also covered by customary international law or are international crimes when committed in certain circumstances (for example, as crimes against humanity). They include those which were listed as ‘treaty crimes’ in the ILC draft of the ICC Statute, but which were excluded from the final Rome Statute in the course of the negotiations. Particular transnational crimes may in the future come to be dealt with as international crimes within the jurisdiction of an international court, if States believe that the values they conflict with are sufficiently important to the international community and that international prosecution is an effective way of dealing with them. New transnational crimes emerge, as States develop new suppression conventions.