(AP) — Judges have approved a request by the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor to reopen an investigation into war crimes and crimes against humanity in Afghanistan, saying Afghan authorities are not carrying out meaningful probes into the alleged crimes.
The court announced the decision Monday, saying that authorities in Kabul have not established that “Afghanistan has investigated, or was investigating, in a manner that covers the full scope of the Prosecutor’s intended investigations and that would justify even a partial deferral of the court’s investigations.”
The decision comes just over a year after Prosecutor Karim Khan announced that he wanted to resume an ICC probe in Afghanistan because under the country’s new rulers there was “no longer the prospect of genuine and effective domestic investigations” in the country.
Judges at the global court authorized an investigation by Khan’s predecessor, Fatou Bensouda, in 2020 covering offenses allegedly committed by Afghan government forces, the IslamicEmirate, American troops and U.S. foreign intelligence operatives dating back to 2002. The United States are not a member of the court and do not recognize its jurisdiction.
The decision to investigate Americans led to the Trump administration slapping sanctions on Bensouda, who has since left office. However, the probe was shelved after Afghan authorities asked to take over the case — known at the court as requesting deferral.
The ICC is a court of last resort, set up in 2002 to prosecute alleged atrocities in countries that cannot or will not bring perpetrators to justice — known as the principle of complementarity.
