The Case Against the Accused

CONCLUSIONS

COMBINATION OF VIOLATIONS

In light of the preceding qualifications, we must conclude that the actions of the different perpetrators of the massacres at Sabra and Shatila constitute a combination of material and intentional violations. The same facts constitute war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of genocide.

There is no ruling in either customary or conventional law to oppose the application of several qualifications to the same fact or combination of facts. On the contrary: in the first case judged by the ICTR in Arusha (the Akayesu case), a combination of violations was established.^[66]

A combination of violations was also established by the French Cassation Court in the Barbie^[67] case.

CONCLUSION

The actions committed at Sabra and Shatila together constitute a crime of genocide, a crime against humanity, war crimes and grave violations of the 1949 IV Geneva Conventions.

The present complaint is based on the aforementioned qualifications, which are punishable in international customary law (ius cogens) as well as in positive Belgian law.

[The Case Against The Accused]

Footnotes

[66] ICTR, first chamber, ICTR-96-4-T of 2 September 1998, §§468 and following. See in particular §496, treating the problem of combination of crimes: “With regard to its Statute, the Chamber is of the opinion that the violations targeted in the Statute – genocide, crimes against humanity and violations of Article 3 common to the Geneva Conventions and its Additional Protocol II – include different constituent elements and, above all, their suppression aims at protecting distinct interests. There is then reason to retain them for similar facts. Moreover, following the case, it may be necessary to obtain condemnation of more than one of the infractions in order to give the measure of crimes committed by the accused. For example, the general who gave the order to kill all prisoners of war belonging to a given ethnic group, with the intention of eliminating that group, would be guilty at the same time of genocide and of violating article 3, although not necessarily of crimes against humanity. A condemnation for genocide and for violations of article 3 would then give the measure of comportment of the accused general.”

[67] Judgement of 20 December 1985; Bulletin of Judgments of the Cassation Court, 1985, pp. 1038 ff.

The above text is an extract from the Complaint lodged in Belgium against Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Amos Yaron and other Israelis and Lebanese responsible for the massacre. The full text of the Complaint can be found in the section of this website titled The Case Against The Accused.

[The Case Against The Accused]

Dr. Laurie King-Irani is North American Coordinator of International Campaign for Justice for the Victims of Sabra & Shatila. For media queries, write to coordinator@indictsharon.net. For website queries, write to webmaster@indictsharon.net.

Surfed directly to this page? Add navigation frames here.

This page is part of indictsharon.net, the website of the International Campaign for Justice for the Victims of Sabra & Shatila, offering news on the case lodged in Belgium against Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and other Israelis and Lebanese responsible for the massacre, killing, rape and disappearance of civilians that took place in Beirut between 16 and 18 September 1982 in the camps of Sabra and Shatila and the surrounding area.

Copyright notice: All content copyright ©2002 indictsharon.net unless otherwise noted. No unauthorised mirroring of any part or all of this site is permitted. Links to this site or to parts of it are welcomed. Materials may be printed from this site and photocopied for activist or classroom use. Information about photographs used on this website.

website by nigelparry.net