What is it about?
Bystanders of mass crimes, those who could have stopped or prevented the crimes but decided not to do so, are left outside the scope of International Criminal Justice, although they were indirectly involved in the perpetration of the crimes. This paper examines whether the duty to rescue, a notion already used in Criminal Law at the domestic level regarding bystanders of ordinary crimes, could be integrated to International Criminal Justice to fill this gap.
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Why is it important?
The purpose of International Criminal Justice is to respond to the commission of mass crimes by shedding light on the role of the perpetrators and giving the victims access to justice. The response is, however, incomplete because it does not leave any room to take into account the collective aspect of mass crimes and the influence of bystanders of mass crimes. This paper explores the option to use the duty to rescue, already existing at the domestic level, to address this shortcoming and examines whether the duty to rescue could be integrated to International Criminal Justice.
Perspectives
I hope this article can shed a new light on the issue of responsibility for mass crimes and the evolution of International Criminal Justice to address the collective aspect of these crimes. By writing this article, I also wanted to use my knowledge of the civil law and common law legal traditions to propose new solutions and promote cross-fertilisation.
Auriane Botte-Kerrison
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Responsibility for Bystanders in Mass Crimes: Towards a Duty to Rescue in International Criminal Justice, International Criminal Law Review, October 2017, Brill,
DOI: 10.1163/15718123-01705001.
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