ICC Pre-Trial Chamber II Dismisses Mr. Bemba's Request for Compensation and Damages

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Jean-Pièrre Bemba Gombo
President of Mouvement de Libération du Congo "MLC"

Pre-Trial Chamber II of the International Criminal Court “ICC” rendered its decision this May 18, 2020 on the claim for compensation and damages from Jean-Pierre Bemba. 

 Mr. Bemba was arrested in May 2008 following an ICC arrest warrant and was acquitted by the ICC Appeals Chamber on June 8, 2018.

The Chamber noted that Mr. Bemba's claim had two components: a claim for compensation under article 85 (3) of the Rome Statute and a claim for damages linked to the alleged mismanagement by the Registry of the ICC assets frozen on the orders of the judges of the Court.

Regarding the first part, the Chamber considered that Mr. Bemba had not established that he had suffered a serious and manifest miscarriage of justice within the meaning of article 85 of the Rome Statute of the ICC and, therefore, refused to exercise his discretion to grant compensation to Mr. Bemba.

With regard to the second aspect, the Chamber concluded that this question did not fall within the scope and application of article 85 of the Rome Statute of the ICC and therefore rejected it. The Chamber also noted that, since the responsibility for the proper execution of a request for cooperation from the Court rests mainly with the requested States, the role of the Registry being limited to facilitating their communication with the Court, its decision is without prejudice to the right Mr Bemba to have recourse to other remedies and possibilities which would otherwise be open to him concerning alleged damage in relation to his assets as a result of measures taken in the context of the execution of the Court's decisions.

In addition, the Chamber noted that the Bemba case provides an example of the gravity of the consequences of the absence of statutory limits on the length of the proceedings or, more importantly, of pre-trial detention. While stressing the responsibility of the Court to ensure the expeditiousness of the proceedings as a fundamental principle of the right to a fair trial and to streamline its own proceedings accordingly, the Chamber considered it urgent that the States parties embark on a review of the Statute in order to consider remedying these limitations.

Cassien Tribunal Aungane, Editor

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