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The Assembly of States Parties

The Assembly of States Parties (ASP) consists of all States who are party to the 1998 Rome Statute which established the International Criminal Court. The Assembly has a special significance - not only is it the governing body of the Court but its members were closely involved in the negotiation of the Rome Statute and other important Court documents.

Unlike the ad hoc tribunals such as ICTY and ICTR which were established by Security Council resolutions under the auspices of the United Nations, the ASP has a unique, and continuing hands on, role in the running of the Court. For example, any amendments proposed to the Rome Statute, Elements of Crimes or Rules of Procedure and Evidence (RPE) have to be approved by a plenary session of the ASP and the ASP regularly decides on substantial issues affecting the day-to-day operation of the Court. By contrast amendments to the RPE at ICTR, ICTY and the Special Court for Sierra Leone can be dealt with directly by the judges of the respective tribunals and Court.

The ASP has a Bureau composed of a President, two Vice-Presidents and 18 members. It also has several smaller working groups that meet throughout the year to discuss in more detail issues such as the definition of the crime of aggression. It has a Secretariat based at the Court in the Hague. The ASP meets in plenary session at least once a year in the Hague and/or New York.

Fourth session of ASP

The most recent (4th) ASP took place in November/December 2005 in the Hague, with the session continuing in New York in January of 2006. The Assembly is attended by a number of non-governmental and professional legal organisations, some countries which are not States Parties attend as observers.

Significant developments arising from the Fourth meeting of the ASP are as follows.

The Regulations for the Trust Fund for Victims were adopted. The Trust Fund provides for the payment of reparations to victims of crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court and their families. The Code of Conduct for Defence Counsel was also adopted, after some discussion regarding an article dealing with fee splitting (ie where a client proposes to a prospective counsel that they share his or her fee). The provision originally proposed to deal with this problem required the counsel to report an approach made by a client to the Registrar. It was objected to by some States and non-governmental organisations as violating attorney/client privilege. A compromise provision was adopted stipulating that defence counsel sign an undertaking not to indulge in fee splitting and warn any client who makes such a proposal that it is prohibited.

The ASP requested the Registrar to submit a comprehensive report of planned outreach activities (ie training on the Court’s mandate, mainly done in countries with situations before the Court) for presentation to the next meeting of the Assembly. The ASP decided to establish an ICC New York Liaison Office at the United Nations in line with the recommendation of the Working Group. At the resumed ASP session in New York, six new judges were elected (five of whom had already worked as ICC judges for three years).

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