Presentation On 17th July 1998 the United Nations Conference on the Establishment of an International Criminal Court adopted in Rome the Statute of the Court, thus setting a landmark in the development of international law against impunity for crimes that offend the very conscience of mankind. The adoption of the Rome Statute not only represents a major achievement for the UN and for the entire international community, but also responds to the ever increasing demand for justice stemming from world public opinion in the aftermath of recent unspeakable atrocities perpetrated in various parts of the globe.
Both at the diplomatic and scholarly levels, a stimulating debate is under way regarding the most important provisions of the Statute and their impact on the effectiveness of the Court created by the Rome Conference.
Meanwhile, the process of signature of the Statute has advanced considerably (as of today 93 States have signed), and various campaigns have been launched to ensure that the sixty ratifications necessary for its entry into force are reached by the year 2000.
The Rome Conference has also established a Preparatory Commission entrusted with the task of elaborating various instruments to integrate the Statute, such as the rules of procedure and evidence of the Court and the so-called "elements of crimes". The timely and successful conclusion of the work of the Preparatory Commission, which already met for three sessions in 1999 in New York, is equally essential in order to allow the Court to be fully operational.
Against this background, the University of Trento, Italy, organized an international meeting (13-15 May 1999) aimed at assessing the results of the Rome Conference and the prospects for the functioning of the International Criminal Court. The meeting was attended by scholars and diplomats (in particular, delegates who represented their countries at the Rome Conference), by students and representatives of intergovernmental and Non-Governmental Organizations. The proceedings of the meeting will appear in a volume to be published by the Department of Legal Sciences of the University of Trento (Mauro Politi and Giuseppe Nesi editors).
During the meeting, that took place at the Law Faculty, the major issues concerning the ICC were discussed. In the light of the limited number of States that have ratified the Statute, the proposal was launched of creating a "Group of action" formed by parliamentarians in the signatories and non-signatories States and representatives of those Non-Governmental Organizations that played a major role in supporting the establishment of the ICC. According to this proposal - presented at the end of the meeting by the Permanent Representative of Italy to the United Nations, Ambassador Francesco Paolo Fulci - this Group should be named T 82+ (T for Trento, and 82 as the number of States that signed the Statute as of May 1999). The aim of the T 82+ should be that of encouraging and fostering in each State the process of ratification of the Statute and provide information concerning such process and related possible difficulties. In this respect, the NGOs Coalition for the ICC has accepted to play a major role in contacting relevant parliamentarians who would will be willing to act as "focal points" in their respective countries. The T82+ project is now well underway and we are confident that it will contribute substantially to the entry into force of the Rome Statute in the shortest possible time.
24 January 2000
