Draft Crimes Against Humanity Convention: Prosecuting the Crime Against Humanity of Apartheid: Never, Again

by | Oct 1, 2019 | AYIH, AYIH 2018

Draft Crimes Against Humanity Convention: Prosecuting the Crime Against Humanity of Apartheid: Never, Again

Authors Christopher Gevers

ISSN: 2521-2621
Affiliations: Lecturer, School of Law, University of KwaZulu-Natal
Source: African Yearbook on International Humanitarian Law, 2018, p. 25 – 49

Abstract

Despite being declared a crime against humanity by the United Nations General Assembly in 1966, and being the subject of a convention signed by more than half of the world’s states to demand its punishment (the 1973 Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid), there has never been a single prosecution of the crime against humanity of apartheid committed in South Africa. This paper interrogates the commitment of an ‘invisible college of international (criminal) lawyers’ never to prosecute apartheid, both at Rome in 1998 and more recently in the case of the Crimes Against Humanity Initiative and International Law Commission to produce a specialised convention on crimes against humanity. It argues that at best the ‘symbolic’ inclusion of apartheid in the last-mentioned signifies a commitment once again never to prosecute this crime against humanity (this time at the national level), and at worst discloses the racial politics of international criminal law that render the prosecution of crimes committed by the West or in its name not only untimely, but unthinkable.

Draft Crimes Against Humanity Convention: Domestic Guidance for International Criminal Justice: Lessons from South Africa

by | Oct 1, 2019 | AYIH, AYIH 2018

Draft Crimes Against Humanity Convention: Domestic Guidance for International Criminal Justice: Lessons from South Africa

Authors Max du Plessis

ISSN: 2521-2621
Affiliations: Senior Counsel KwaZulu-Natal Bar (Ubunye Chambers), and Associate Tenant, Thulamela Chambers, Johannesburg and Doughty Street Chambers, London. Honorary Research Fellow, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Associate Fellow, Chatham House London, and Adjunct Research Fellow, Law Futures Centre Griffith University
Source: African Yearbook on International Humanitarian Law, 2018, p. 8 – 24

Abstract

The proposed Crimes Against Humanity Convention (CAHC) is an important development, particularly at a time when the International Criminal Court (ICC) is under increasing pressure. Important questions have been raised, including whether such a convention is truly needed, whether it is politically feasible, and whether some of the draft provisions should be modified. In this article, the author considers the questions raised, and proposes answers from an African and realist perspective, having litigated some of the international criminal justice cases before South African courts. The author contends that international criminal justice, particularly at a time when the ICC is beset by troubles, may best be achieved through domestic efforts at accountability. The drafters of the CAHC should thus take meaningful account of the domestication of international criminal justice, and the lessons to be learnt from national systems that have found themselves at the forefront of the very debates that have animated the drafters of the CAHC, and the Rome Statute before it. If those lessons are to be taken seriously — including the lessons generated by African states and their courts — then the draft CAHC might be improved and some of its provisions sharpened.

The Law of Taxation

by | Sep 30, 2019 | ASSA, ASSA 2012

The Law of Taxation

Authors Peter Surtees

ISBN: 978 1 48513 300 1
Affiliations: Registered Tax Practitioner, Director: Norton Rose South Africa Tax Services, Professor, Department of Finance and Taxation, University of Cape Town
Source: Annual Survey of South African Law, 2012, p. 996 – 1045

Abstract

None

Public International Law

by | Sep 30, 2019 | ASSA, ASSA 2012

Public International Law

Authors Hennie Strydom

ISBN: 978 1 48513 300 1
Affiliations: Professor in Public International Law, National Research Foundation Chair in International Law, University of Johannesburg
Source: Annual Survey of South African Law, 2012, p. 977 – 995

Abstract

None

Pension Funds Law

by | Sep 30, 2019 | ASSA, ASSA 2012

Pension Funds Law

Authors Muthundinne Sigwadi

ISBN: 978 1 48513 300 1
Affiliations: Attorney of the High Court of South Africa, Chair of Mercantile Law Department and Associate Professor of Law, University of South Africa, Pretoria
Source: Annual Survey of South African Law, 2012, p. 960 – 976

Abstract

None

Miscellaneous Contracts (Agency, Carriage, Deposit, Donation, Loan, Partnership, Service and Surety)

by | Sep 30, 2019 | ASSA, ASSA 2012

Miscellaneous Contracts (Agency, Carriage, Deposit, Donation, Loan, Partnership, Service and Surety)

Authors MM Koekemoer, JT Pretorius

ISBN: 978 1 48513 300 1
Affiliations: Lecturer, Department of Mercantile Law, School of Law, University of South Africa; Attorney of the High Court of South Africa; Attorney, Professor of Law, Department of Mercantile Law, School of Law, University of South Africa; Life Member, Clare Hall, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom Professor Pretorius contributed the section on Suretyship.
Source: Annual Survey of South African Law, 2012, p. 894 – 959

Abstract

None