Yr 12 Legal - International Crime and the Holocaust

The visit today to the Sydney Jewish Museum brought back to me the importance of ordinary people taking action. Making sure that despite what the Professor said "we don't learn lessons from history" that when a opportunity presents itself we do not idly sit back and watch.


An interesting sidenote is the Vasiljkovic case where the first successful extradition of a person living in Australia may occur. A lack of political will has meant that previous war criminals in Australia have escaped punishment and may have even been protected by ASIO according to historian Mark Aarons.

In the recent SMH article Fergus Hanson says "Australia draws an odd distinction between suspected war criminals living outside Australia and those living within our borders. Australia is wholehearted in its effort to bring external war criminals to justice.

Despite resistance in some quarters, we became a member of the International Criminal Court in 2002 and last year we gave $15 million to various international criminal courts and tribunals." SMH 11/02/09

What this case highlights is that international law is highly difficult to enforce and thus largely ineffective without the strong will of politicians who may criticise others yet be weak in their own backyards. The Rome Statute setting up the the ICC was signed in 1998, Australia did not become a member for another 4 years??

For those of you who are interested in further reading about recent international issues see;
Cambodia (Feb '09)
Rwanda (Feb '09)
the Former Yugoslavia (July '08)


"the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men (and women) to do nothing" Edmund Burke.