The International Criminal Court, the Security Council, and the Politics of Impunity in Darfur

This article analyzes the political challenges confronting the International Criminal Court (ICC) in its efforts to bring war crimes suspects to trial in connection with mass atrocities committed in the Darfur region of Sudan. It chronicles and examines the battles over cooperation between the ICC and the defiant Sudanese government that have forestalled the handover of suspects such as Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir. It also seeks to explain why the Security Council, in its ambivalence toward the ICC, has not vigorously pressed Sudan to fulfill its legal obligation to cooperate.