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On the 10 and 11 March 2015, Parliamentarians for Global Action (PGA) organized, together with the Senate of the Dominican Republic, a Parliamentary Workshop on the Ratification and Implementation of the Rome Statute and the Kampala Amendments.

The Parliamentary Workshop was held in the Senate of the Dominican Republic, in Santo Domingo, with the aim of furthering understanding of the Rome Statute-related processes in each country of the region, i.e. ratification of the Statute, implementation of crimes and legal principles and/or creation of national cooperation mechanisms.

Parliamentarians present in the Workshop were given the possibility to exchange with international experts, court officials as well as share experiences with their parliamentary colleagues from the region.

The workshop provided a platform for discussion and action on the role of Parliamentarians, the Government and society as a whole to create the necessary legislative conditions for effective national investigations and prosecutions of international crimes as well as full cooperation with the ICC, specifically through comprehensive and effective implementing legislation of the Rome Statute, encompassing crimes, general principles of law and internal cooperation mechanisms.

Furthermore, the ratification and implementation of the Kampala Review Conference amendments to the Rome Statute concerning the use of certain prohibited weapons as war crimes in non-international armed conflicts and the definition and jurisdictional regime for the crime of aggression were thoroughly discussed on the second day of the Workshop.

The President of the Senate of the Dominican Republic, Sen. Cristina Lizardo, along with Dep. Minou Tavárez Mirabal, President of PGA, Dep. Víctor Bisonó, President of the National Group of PGA, Dep. Margareta Cederfelt, Treasurer of PGA, and Dr Cesar Pina Toribio, Legal Consultant to the Presidency in Santo Domingo, received the delegation of international experts, which presented different topics throughout the 2 days of the Workshop.

International experts participating included PGA Secretary General, Dr. David Donat Cattin; from the Office of the Prosecution of the ICC: Cooperation Officer, Ms. Antonia Pereira de Sousa, and Situation Analyst, Ms. Eugenia Valenzuela, from the Registry of the ICC, Cooperation Officer Ms. Anne Aurore Bertrand, and Mr. Gerhard van Rooyen, Advisor to the Victims and Witnesses Unit; Mr. Jörn Eiermann of the Permanent Mission of Liechtenstein to the United Nations; Mr. Hugo Relva, Legal Advisor Amnesty International; Ms. Alexandra Ortiz Signoret, Legal Advisor to the International Committee to the Red Cross; the CICC’s Regional Coordinator for the Americas, Ms. Michelle Reyes; and PGA Program Officer, Ms. Romina Morello.

In this meeting the importance and relevance of universal ratification of the Rome Statute and its full national implementation to advance the goal of putting an end to impunity was stressed and all parliamentarians and government officials present committed to support all the efforts to accomplish that goal.

The President of PGA, Dep. Minou Tavárez Mirabal opened the workshop, emphasizing the importance of having a no-impunity zone in Central America and the Caribbean. She called to all the non-States parties to the Rome Statue from this region to immediately ratify the Rome Statute. Moreover, the PGA President urged parliamentarians to incorporate the legal principles and the crimes included in the Rome Statute system in their domestic legislation, as well as to take action and legislative measures to create effective ways to cooperate with the Court as another way to contribute to the fight against impunity.

The Opening speech was then followed by presentations from the panel analyzing the Contribution of States to the Effective Functioning of the International Criminal Court, in which the PGA Secretary General, Dr. David Donat Cattin, explained the general legal framework of the member States' obligations to cooperate with the ICC. Later on, Court officials made an overview of specific cooperation’s requests that a State can receive from the Office of the Prosecutor of the ICC as well as from the Registry. Finally, Ms. Romina Morello presented the main features of the PGA Reference Law of State Cooperation with the ICC for Latin American Countries and Dep. Gonzalo Ramirez from Costa Rica, as member of the first PGA national group that has tabled a bill on cooperation based on the PGA reference law, made a brief description of the legislative process that, together with other PGA members, he has supported in order to comply with the duty established by art. 88 of the Rome Statute.

The next panel on the Rome Statute and the Strengthening of National Legal Systems in the Fight Against Impunity, focused on the general principles of law contained in the Rome Statute, and was integrated by PGA Member, Sen. Julio Cesar Valentin who looked at Complementarity by presenting the newly approved Criminal Code of the Dominican Republic which includes definitions of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and crime of aggression as well as most of the international law principles included in the Rome Statute. Dr. David Donat Cattin then explained the Non-Retroactive character of the Rome Statute, followed by Mr. Hugo Relva who looked at Imprescriptibility of the crimes. Finally, Ms. Michelle Reyes explained art. 27 of the Rome Statute on the principle of no- Immunities, giving examples where this principle was implemented in national legislations of countries in the region.

The final panel of that day aimed at explaining the Crimes under ICC jurisdiction and illustrating examples of national implementation of these crimes as well as presenting some suggestions for the parliamentarians present regarding their Criminal Codes definitions of the Crimes.

On the 11th March 2015, the workshop began with a session in which Ms. Eugenia Valenzuela, Situation Analyst at the Office of the Prosecutor, presented on the recent developments at the ICC, providing summaries on the situations, investigations and cases, as well as the status of preliminary investigations. Members of the audience then took the opportunity to ask questions to all the Court officials on the work of the Prosecution as well as on cooperation related issues.

The following panel overviewed the Kampala Amendments on the Crime of Aggression, with Mr. Jörn Eiermann analyzing the amendments on the Crime of Aggression in light of the prohibition of illegal use of force, looking at the definition of the crime, the elements of crime, and the conditions for the ICC to exercise jurisdiction for this crime. Dip. Rony Monge (Costa Rica) gave an account of his country’s experience of the process of ratification of the Kampala Amendment and called all his colleagues to take similar actions in their own countries. After these presentations, an overview was given, showing the current situation and analysis on the national laws of the countries within the Central American and Caribbean region, which was followed by an open discussion on the ratification and substantive Implementation of the Kampala Amendments.

Amendments to War Crimes was the topic of the next panel, with Ms. Alexandra Ortiz Signoret form the International Committee of the Red Cross, overviewing the amendments to art. 8 of the Rome Statute, and the harmonization of the law on international and non-international armed conflicts through this amendment.

The final panel summarized the issues discussed throughout the workshop, and the necessary actions to be taken in specific cases, before reading and approving the Plan of Action for Santo Domingo 2015, which was presented by PGA President Dep. Minou Tavárez Mirabal.

The workshop was then closed by PGA Treasurer Dep. Margareta Cederfelt, who reaffirmed the commitment of PGA to promote the fight against impunity in the world, and called upon Parliamentarians to ratify and fully implement the Rome Statute and the Kampala Amendments as soon as possible. 

At the end of the Workshop, informal discussions were held with parliamentarians to discuss how to foster the legislative measures that where discussed in the Parliamentary Workshop.

In the margins of the Workshop, PGA leading members from the Dominican Republic, the PGA Secretariat as well as Court officials met with the Prosecutor General of Dominican Republic to notably discuss the signature of Ad Hoc agreements as well as the views of his office on the cooperation bill with the ICC that PGA members will introduce in Parliament. Moreover, the PGA-ICC delegation met with the President of the Supreme Court, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Presidency Legal Advisor to discuss, among other topics, political support to the ICC, ratification of the Kampala Amendments and cooperation with the Court.