PGA President Dip. Margarita Stolbizer (Argentina) addressed the Opening Session of a national Seminar to strengthen the engagement of all branches of the Argentinean Government in the fight against impunity, featuring the President of the ICC Silvia Fernandez de Gurmendi as key note speaker.
Supreme Court President Justice Ricardo Lorenzetti, Justice Minister German Garavano, Deputy-Minister for Foreign Affairs Pedro Raul Villagra Delgado and Deputy-Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies Patricia Jimenez addressed an audience of 200 Magistrates (Judges and Prosecutors), Government officials, Parliamentarians and representatives of civil society, the academia and the legal professions.
This event, initiated by the PGA Argentina National Group, was marked by the announcement of Argentina's deposit of the instrument of ratification of the Kampala Amendments to the Rome Statute of the ICC on the crime of aggression and war crimes, and it followed the conclusion of two voluntary agreements on cooperation between Argentina and the ICC on enforcement of sentences (April 2017) and protection of witnesses (November 2016).
While the Minister of Justice declared that Argentina will engage in a process to conclude a new agreement on interim and final release, the President of the ICC called for renewed Argentinean leadership to promote the universality and the full implementation of the Rome Statute, with special emphasis on the 5 States belonging to the group of Latin American and Caribbean States that have not joined yet the ICC system against impunity: Bahamas, Cuba, Haiti, Jamaica and Nicaragua.
The Deputy-Minister for Foreign Affairs and several officials representing the Executive and the Judiciary undertook the commitment to continue and intensify Argentina's role in support of the new system of International Criminal Justice created by the Rome Statute at 15 years of its entry into force (2002-2017).
High level Parliamentarians, both in their constitutional capacity and as individual members of PGA, attended the event to signal the strong leadership of the Legislative branch in the fight against impunity for present, future and past atrocities. Legislators included Dip. Cornelia Schmidt-Lierman (Chair of the PGA Argentina National Group), Dip. Luis Petri (Chair of the Security Committee), Dip. Karina Banfi, Dip. Lucila Dure, Dip. Carla Pitiot and Sen. Jaime Linares.
The event was also addressed by PGA's Secretary General Dr. David Donat-Cattin and ICC Trust Fund for Victims' Board Member Dr. Felipe Michelini (Uruguay), who approached the theme of the fight against impunity in a victims rights' perspective. Amnesty International's legal advisor Hugo Relva made a comparative analysis on key issues relating to the effective domestic implementation by States Parties to the Rome Statute, while ICC Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) Director Fabricio Guariglia provided detailed analysis on the unique challenges to investigate and prosecute extremely complex and serious crimes in conflict situations. All conference segments were followed by questions and answers' sessions.