In March 2015, the United Nations urged the International Criminal Court to bring charges
against ISIS for their alleged war crimes.
The UN says that ISIS committed genocide against the Yazidis, and other gratuitous violence
against civilians.
So what exactly IS a war crime?
And how are they prosecuted?
The concept of war crimes is actually somewhat new-age.
Before World War 2, war crimes were often considered part of the whole wartime experience,
and only sometimes prosecuted on a national level.
After World War I, very few people were convicted of war crimes.
But that changed after World War 2, because of the international scope, and the extreme
loss of life associated with events like the Jewish Holocaust.
Major officials were held more accountable for the atrocities.
The first International Military Tribunals to investigate major war crimes were held
in the late 1940s at Nuremberg and Tokyo.
As a result of these main trials and other smaller ones, more than 10,000 Nazis and Nazi-allies
were convicted of war crimes, and over 1,000 were executed.
So what specifically constitutes a war crime?
Well, there are three major sub-categories: Crimes against Peace, Crimes against humanity,
and traditional war crimes.
Crimes against peace include planning and waging war.
Crimes against humanity include murder, enslavement and other violence towards civilians.
And traditional war crimes include mistreating Prisoners of War, destroying property that’s
not relevant to the war - like ISIS destroying historical artifacts, and other violations
of wartime laws or customs.
Nowadays, anyone, even civilians may be tried for war crimes.
How is a war crime prosecuted?
According to the Geneva Conventions, which 196 state parties have ratified , member states
MUST seek out and try their accused war criminals - either within a national court, an international
court, or a mixed tribunal.
And if a state doesn’t bring charges against their own war criminals, the United Nations
can mandate a trial against them, from another country.
They did this in the 1990s for civil wars in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda.
In 1998 the United Nations established a permanent International Criminal Court, or the ICC,
which takes cases dealing exclusively with genocide, crimes against humanity and war
crimes.
However, the International Criminal Court, and other war crime trials have had difficulties
actually prosecuting or punishing criminals.
The enforcement of any trial convictions still remains in the hands of the state.
For instance, the president of Sudan, Omar al-Bashir stands accused by the ICC of several
war crimes, yet is unwilling to stand trial, and the state will not extradite him.
Similarly, the ICC would have a hard time prosecuting ISIS of war crimes because of
the high-turnover rate and secrecy surrounding their leaders.
Although the ICC is an important judicial affiliate of the United Nations, its ultimate
power to enforce court rulings on war crimes, in defiant governments is extremely limited.
If you’d like to learn more about what power the UN actually has, watch our video here.
To see what life is really like inside of the Gaza strip under Israeli occupation, check
out the video from AJ+ below.
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