Episode 133 – What’s next after ICC’s Karim Khan steps aside? with Alix Vuillemin and Danya Chaikel

By Janet Andersonfeature interviews, podcast episodes
Alix top left, then Janet, Steph and Danya clockwise

Last week we got the unexpected announcement that International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor Karim Khan has stepped aside amid the external investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct and retaliation against whistleblowers. To make sense of it all Janet and Steph sat down with friends of the show Danya Chaikel, the representative of human rights watchdog FIDH at the ICC and Alix Vuillemin who heads the NGO Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice.

We go into the background a bit on the episode but is you want to read up on what has been reported here are links for a look at what has come out so farabout the allegations against Khan, There were initial stories in the AP, the Guardian and Reuters.

 In recent week more details emerged from stories by the Wall Street Journal and Dropsite News.

The prosecutor has publicly denied these allegations, and of course must be presumed innocent unless or until we know the results of the external investigation into his alleged conduct which is ongoing.

But what will happen with the results of the inquiry ? We sat down with Alix and Danya to work out what we know, what we can expect to happen and how they think it will be handled and how they think it should be handled. We discuss the 5 year old Independent Expert Review, the Rome Statute, the Staff Rules and the Staff Regulations (or if you prefer it, the consolidated version) and the Regulations of the OTP and the rules of the ASP. And we are sure there is more!

We also talked about the background and the institutional problems the ICC seems to have when dealing with cases of alleged misconduct because our longtime listeners will know that we have been here before in a way.

In June 2020 we already spoke with Danya and Alix and others on what it means when the ICC statute says the prosecutor must be of high moral character in Episode 26

To get away from some issues and to explore others, our guests chose Bearer of Bad News by Elizabeth Dini (formerly of the ICC) which is about to come out, and the book and series The Power by Naomi Alderman

This podcast has been produced as part of a partnership with JusticeInfo.net, an independent website in French and English covering justice initiatives in countries dealing with serious violence. It is a media outlet of Fondation Hirondelle, based in Lausanne, Switzerland.