Malaysia Not Ready To Join International Criminal Court. Most Banana Republics Usually Never Are

Malaysia is not yet ready to sign the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), the Dewan Rakyat was told Wednesday.

Foreign Ministry parliamentary secretary Datuk Ahmad Shabery Cheek said that although Kuala Lumpur recognised the statute in principle, there were lingering questions over the interpretation of certain terms.

"Although many countries have ratified it, there's no need for us to rush headlong into it as many other big powers and so-called champions of human rights have yet to do so," he said in reply to M. Kulasegaran (DAP-Ipoh Barat) during the question-and-answer session in the Dewan Rakyat here.

The court was established by the Rome Statute of the ICC, so called because it was adopted in Rome on July 17, 1998. The statute entered into force on July 1, 2002. To date, 105 countries have become parties to the statute.

Ahmad Shabery said that signing the statute meant that Malaysia may have to change some of its laws.

He further said that many countries had to ink the ICC treaty as they wanted to put their war-checkered past behind them.

Malaysia did not have that kind of problem and, for this reason, there was no need for the country to make a hasty decision with regard to the ICC treaty, he said.

The ICC is an independent, permanent court that tries persons accused of the most serious crimes of international concern, namely genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. (Bernama)

***** So basically this stubborn reluctance to ratify, boils down to the fact that we have to change certain internationally unacceptable and draconian laws which keep the government free from domestic criticism, allow the authorities to suppress any attempt to publicly expose government wrongdoing and to indiscriminately misuse the power of arrest for petty political reasons.

The other lame excuses given by the Foreign Ministry parliamentary secretary is pure sandiwara and not to be taken seriously.
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