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The Dictator's Advocate

To bring the most heinous crimes to justice, the International Criminal Court needs more than judges and prosecutors — it needs world-calibre counsel. For 10 years, the International Criminal Defence Attorneys Association has been on the case.

By Huxley Dean


[ 2007-11-28 ]

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The sleek, white curves of the seat of the International Criminal Court (ICC) rising up from the streets of The Hague, in the Netherlands, are a picture of utopian efficiency. Certainly, this court looks forward to a progressive future; it is mandated not only to try defendants accused of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, but to prevent the waging of war itself. If the nations of the world are to subscribe to such a vision, however, the ICC must uphold the highest standards of justice for victims and defendants alike. This is the challenge that Elise Groulx first took up a decade ago, by founding the International Criminal Defence Attorneys Association (ICDAA).

As a young student in Québec, Groulx’s interests were already international in scope. She studied law at the Université de Montréal and political science at UQAM, then went on to earn degrees in criminology at the Sorbonne in Paris and comparative law at the London School of Economics. She joined the Québec Bar in 1976, establishing her practice in Montréal. In 1994, when the UN issued a call for defence attorneys to serve at the ad hoc war-crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, she was one of the first private practitioners to step forward. The international criminal justice movement was picking up speed, and in 1996 she was invited by Louise Arbour (presently serving as High Commissioner for Human Rights at the UN) to attend a global conference on the creation of the ICC. “I noticed no one at the conference was talking about the role of the defence in the new court,” Groulx says. “I was concerned and I spoke about my concerns to Louise Arbour, who encouraged me to act on them.”

Groulx recalls her train trip back to Paris as a pivotal moment in her life. It was then that she first formulated the idea for the ICDAA, which she founded in 1997 as a complement and check for the ICC. The court was established in 1998 and opened its doors in 2003.

WHO DEFENDS THE DEFENDERS

The ICDAA is a body of “missionaries for the presumption of innocence,” says Groulx, who continues to serve as its president. “There is a bias inherent in any court in the world. That bias is highlighted when the court is built on just two pillars.” The pillar of the defence can be easily neglected or suppressed when dealing with the worst crimes against humanity, tilting the court in favour of the prosecution. The ICDAA advocates for a fair trial for everyone, regardless of the nature of the charges brought against them. They also advocate against arbitrary detention and the arbitrary use of power.


According to Jean-Yves Litampha, Executive Director of the ICDAA, the organization’s current mandate is basically threefold. “First of all, our mission is to strengthen counsel by advocating for and training defence lawyers who are interested in international criminal law and who want to appear before international tribunals, such as the one in Cambodia.”

The ICDAA promotes the rule of law by strengthening judicial capacity in fragile states such as Afghanistan and Haiti, and helping in the fight against corruption.

In Cambodia, an international tribunal has been set up for the Khmer Rouge trials. During the Khmer Rouge’s brief rule of Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, an estimated 1.5 million Cambodians were murdered. Pol Pot, the head of the regime, died in 1998 never having been called to account for his actions. Ten of his senior officials, however, are set to face trial beginning in 2007. A hybrid Cambodian–international court, known as the Extraordinary Chambers in the Court of Cambodia (ECCC), has been formed to investigate the charges of genocide and crimes against humanity that have been levied against them. “We recently presented a project to Foreign Affairs Canada, which details our intended partnership with the defence unit in the ECCC, led by U.K. barrister Rupert Skilbeck, in training and advocating for Cambodian lawyers who will be appearing before the international tribunal,” says Groulx.



DID YOU KNOW?

In 2002, Groulx also founded and became executive president of The Hague-based International Criminal Bar (ICB), which represents lawyers active with the ICC, as well as bar associations from around the globe. In April 2007, the Japan Federation of Bar Associations (an ICB member) mobilized its government to join the ICC; now Japan is the court’s highest-paying G8 signatory. Groulx hopes the ICB can find similar success in the U.S., where the legal profession supports the ICC — but the government does not.



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