Summary
Vietnam’s High People’s Court upheld the death sentence for real estate tycoon Truong My Lan, convicted of embezzlement and bribery in a record $12 billion fraud case.
Lan can avoid execution by returning $9 billion (three-quarters of the stolen funds), potentially reducing her sentence to life imprisonment.
Her crimes caused widespread economic harm, including a bank run and $24 billion in government intervention to stabilize the financial system.
Lan has admitted guilt but prosecutors deemed her actions unprecedentedly damaging. She retains limited legal recourse through retrial procedures.
Which is disgusting, but we will see what happens when it actually happens and in any case the fault of France, not of the ICC.
What makes you think that? If you want to hear me say that Kissinger should have been sentenced to be burned at the stakes, I have zero reservations to give you that.
Please name reasonably recent examples, preferably ones where it is not the US doing it. You can talk about a lot of meddling, but it is really not a common thing of the current west supporting warlords against even remotely legit governments. And the goal is usually very much not destabilization, even if that may be the effect. When we are talking about criminal law, intention matters.
And the ICC is kinda doing the opposite. Really not comparable, as I said.
Fair, but again: I’m not super interested in the US, because we already know that it is a shithole country.
But that’s the thing:
That’s an unfair standard, considering that the ICC has so far sentenced 8 (EIGHT!) people from 2 (TWO) case-groups to prison, both of which concerned civil wars in Africa.
First of all excluding all the white people that they charged since then in three case groups (Georgia, Russia, Israel) is something that you would have justify.
And who should they have prosecuted? Blair obviously (and they did infect investigate it!), but other than that I don’t see many obvious candidates that are very clearly missing over whom the court has jursidiction. The thing is: Since the Iraq-war most European countries neither had large civil wars, nor did they really participate in other wars that were not UN-sanctioned.
The fact of the matter is that they are doing more in Africa simply because Africa has a lot of civil wars that involve a significant amount of particularly illegal forms of warfare such as child-soldiers. So yes, there are more war-crimes in unstable regions.
I guess that is why it went against most of those countries and prosecuted Netanjahu?
Like: It’s actually pretty clear at this point that they are acting increasingly as an independent and neutral instance.
But you can’t argue that based on what other countries are saying whom they are going to extradite. The ICC is independent, that’s the whole point!
Who should then prosecute those crimes that are otherwise not accessible to prosecution? The ICC only gets active if there is no serious attempt at prosecution in the country itself!
Like any international body, the ICC is only as legitimate as it’s member states willingness to participate.
“Let’s not pretend that Africans are somehow infantile children who are not responsible for their own actions.” Mainly that… But it’s kinda besides the point, as you aren’t responsible for who gets prosecuted by the ICC.
“NATO powers such as the United Kingdom and the United States support the Saudi Arabian–led intervention in Yemen primarily through arms sales and technical assistance.[396] France had also made recent military sales to Saudi Arabia”
“The tribunal requested a thorough investigation as some of the evidence indicated “possible acts of genocide”.[28] Its panel found Sri Lanka guilty of genocide at its 7–10 December 2013 hearings in Berman, Germany. It also found that the US and UK were guilty of complicity.”
" 2008 report by the Rwandan government-sponsored Mucyo Commission accused the French government of knowing of preparations for the genocide and helping to train Hutu militia members."
“Since the war began, both regional and international powers have been actively involved in the conflict. A number of reports have been made alleging that China, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates were all providing military support for the Ethiopian government via the sale of weaponized drones.”
“October 2023, political analyst Lena Obermaier argued that Germany is complicit in Israel’s war crimes against Gaza.[6”
"On 12 December 2023, Human Rights Watch said that selling weapons to Israel could make the UK complicit in war crimes. "
"In March, OXFAM released a statement detailing its intention, alongside several other NGOs,[p] to sue Denmark to prevent arms sales to Israel, warning that by selling arms Denmark is “complicit in violations of international humanitarian law … and a plausible genocide”.
Lol, the ICC isn’t run by economically advanced states? They haven’t primarily prosecuted people in poor states?
People in those rich states never participated in war crimes?
And how many POC were prosecuted vs white people?
Sure, western Europeans historically haven’t viewed serbs as “white”. We already talked about Israel.
Again, how many people have been prosecuted that are white?
Ahh yes, the UN is immune from unethical wars…
And why exactly does Africa have a lot of civil wars…? Hmmm…maybe the hundreds of years of western colonialism and interventionist actions on the continent might have something to do with it?
Only to have it’s own member states ignore the court they belong to?
So long as they don’t prosecute anyone from the G7… Sure.
Lol, I’ve said this several times. I don’t inherently think the ICC itself is evil or anything, I just don’t think they’re really effective at doing anything unless it fits within the geopolitical will of its wealthiest member states. The problem is systemic in nature, and no matter what anyone in the ICC believes no international body is truly independent.
Selling weapons to parties engaged in a conflict, to an extent even if they are used for warcrimes is not among the list of crimes that the ICC has jurisdiction for. You can argue that it should be on the list and I’d be inclined to agree with you, but the entire point of a court like this is that it REALLY has to do things by the book to maintain its acceptance.
Not really, it’s actually quite diverse!
Define white… They are prosecuting 6 Russians, 3 Israelis, 3 Georgians, 3 Palestinians and 1 person from Myanmar of 65 people total, the remainder being from a variety of African countries.
Okay, you can of course say that no one prosecuted is white, by setting the standards for being white arbitrarily high. If you demand someone whose ancestors for the last 10 generations have lived in a Norwegian Fjord, then yes, none of them are white. Let me guess, you are from the US? Because this really isn’t a European perspective, the entire distinction between white and non-white matters a lot less here. And not even because there is necessarily less racism, but because the racism that is around isn’t really about whiteness.
Not necessarily, but it has done reasonably well with regards to what it sanctioned and is the relevant body who decides on the legality of wars. Which is what matters here, not whether or not you or me agree with every individual decision.
Yes, but most of those colonialists are no longer available to be judged and since the events predate the Rome statute wouldn’t be accessible to it anyways. History can explain things, but it doesn’t justify or excuse things. At the end of the day, there are more warcrimes in Africa than in Europe, East-Asia and the Americas today.
So far they haven’t and there have also definitely be some that made it clear that they will comply with the rules, as well as some that tried to avoid giving clear statements.
They don’t have jurisdiction for the US and for the other 6 there is no clear precedent. I would expect most of them to comply, though it is unlikely to come up because most of them would likely prosecute their criminals themselves if it reached the point where the ICC would look.
But that is no longer an argument about whether it would deserve the right to execute people.
It has definitely started to show some attitude with Israel. that’s more than most other institutions can say of themselves.