PGA congratulates The Republic of Seychelles who today has deposited her Instrument of Ratification of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) with the United Nations in New York. This brings to 112 the number of States that have joined the ICC system and to 31 the number of African nations that are party to the ICC. Seychelles is the first African State that has ratified the Rome Statute subsequent to the making public of the case of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes against the President of Sudan by the International Criminal Court in July 2008.

Since 2002, PGA has been pleased to work with MPs and government officials on progressing the process of ratification in the Seychelles. In 2002 PGA co-organized with the International Organization of the Francophonie a Conference on ICC Ratification and Implementation in the sub-region hosted by the Parliament of Mauritius, which contributed to the ratifications of Mauritius and  Djibouti in 2002, Comoros in 2006 and Madagascar in 2008. With the Seychelles’ ratification, the entire African Indian Ocean subregion has now become a “no-impunity zone”.

PGA Member, Mr. Bernard Georges, MP, (Seychelles), who addressed the Mauritius Conference in 2002 and the 6th Consultative Assembly of Parliamentarians for the ICC and the Rule of Law in Kampala, Uganda in May 2010, stressed the bipartisan nature of the vote of the Seychelles National Assembly:

On 13 July 2010, the entire Parliament voted unanimously this fundamental treaty that protects the life, well-being and human dignity of victims of the most serious crimes of international concern. - Mr. Georges, who represents Seychelles’ main opposition party.

Former Minister of Foreign Affairs and Attorney General/Minister of Justice and PGA member, Mr. Madan Dulloo, saluted the decision of the Seychelles Government and Parliament, whereby the last of the African Indian Ocean Islands has now become a State Party to the Court.

It is important to have one more African country in the new system of international criminal justice, which is compatible with all legal traditions as well as the Constitutive Act of the African Union (AU) Mr. Dulloo stressed.

In response to a recent recommendation formulated by the AU in respect of the Arrest Warrant pending against the President of Sudan, Mr. Dulloo added that:

The founding treaty of the AU, at its article 4, provides our organization with a firm condemnation and rejection of impunity: Therefore, Arrest Warrants shall be promptly executed, not postponed! We should therefore resolve to propagate the awareness of the importance to protect the integrity and purpose of the Rome Statute across Africa and other continents with the aim to make it truly universal and effective. he concluded.

The Convenor of PGA’s International Law and Human Rights Program, Mrs. Ruth Tuma, MP (Uganda), noted that:

By ratifying the Rome Statute, the Seychelles has confirmed their will to join the other members of the ICC in a new system of global justice where all people shall benefit from the principle of equality before the law.

Mrs. Tuma underlined the nexus between the PGA recent activities in Eastern Africa and the Indian Ocean sub-regions, such as the conference on implementing legislation held in Comoros in February 2010, and the deblockage of the ICC process by the competent authorities in The Seychelles, led by the Secretary General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, former MP Ambassador Barry Fauré. The Seychelles signed the Rome Statute on 28 December 2000, but had not ratified the treaty before its entry into force at the end of 2002.