Riyadh - The head of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) on Monday protested against an international court's decision to reconsider bringing genocide charges against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. Abdel-Rahman Hamid al-Atiya, secretary general of the six-country regional body, said the International Criminal Court (ICC)'s decision last week to reopen the question of whether al-Bashir should face genocide charges for his government's actions in Darfur threatened Qatari-mediated peace talks for the western Sudanese province.
Al-Bashir was in Qatar, a GCC member state, for the talks when the ICC announced its decision on February 3
Al-Atiya said the Doha peace talks "were making progress," saying international courts should not be "politicized," but should uphold "principles of justice and international law."
The head of the GCC called on ICC prosecutors to take action on what he called Israeli war crimes in the Gaza Strip and against the US for the torture of detainees at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison.
International law should be applied while paying due consideration to "the political, economic, and social realities of Sudan, and without undermining efforts towards and peace or threatening the country's unity and regional stability," al-Atiya said.
He called on the UN Security Council "to work urgently to set the record straight, preserve the integrity of international justice and prevent the spread of double-standards."
On March 4, 2009, the ICC indicted al-Bashir, 66, on five counts of crimes against humanity and two of war crimes over the conflict between his government and rebels in the region in western Sudan, but not on genocide charges.
