ICC Prosecutor Vows to Indict Sudan’s President

The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) has vowed to defy international pressure and go ahead to file genocide charges against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. Luis-Moreno Ocampo said the ICC could not simply ignore “strong evidence” in its possession, which he says shows that Bashir personally sanctioned the Sudanese army and state-backed militias to mete out killings, attacks and rapes against ethnic groups in Darfur. The African Union and the Arab League have been pressurizing the ICC to defer its plans to indict Bashir for 10 counts of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur. [PE]