ACTING Chief Justice Antonio Carpio is using the China bogeyman to frighten us out of the decision to withdraw from the International Criminal Court (ICC).

During the oral arguments on the Philippines’ withdrawal from the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the ICC, Carpio warned that pulling out of that treaty would entail losing a “legal deterrent” against China’s possible aggression.

He said that if China established a naval base on Scarborough Shoal or invade the Philippine-occupied Pag-Asa island in the Spratlys, our country would not be able to sue Chinese officials, such as President Xi Jinping and members of the Chinese military for aggression.

Extolling the Rome Statute, Carpio said that it was “the only international treaty in the world that holds military and political leaders of states that commit the crime of aggression individually accountable before an international tribunal. No other.”

Carpio isn’t so precise.

Though the Rome Statute is the only treaty that has established a permanent court for international crimes, such as the crime of aggression, it’s not the only mechanism available in the international political order that could try those crimes.

Article 42 of the UN Charter gives the UN Security Council (UNSC) the power to establish courts that could do that. For example, in 1991, the UNSC established the International Criminal Tribunal to prosecute individuals who committed war crimes in the former Yugoslavia.

Episode aired on October 14, 2018

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