Learn how the ICC Rome Statute and the work of the Court addresses and helps prevent atrocious crimes, while also promoting access to justice and long-term peace.
Join us in supporting the UN's Sustainable Development Goal 16 – SDG16: Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions – and building a more peaceful, more just world.
The ICC and SDG16
The ICC works to promote a more peaceful, just world by promoting access to justice, demanding accountability, and helping to deter crimes. The journey to justice is one towards healing and reconciliation, which paves a path to lasting peace. We call on the world to unite in these goals.
The ICC's founding treaty, The Rome Statute
The Rome Statute created the ICC and Trust Fund for Victims (TFV). It made the ICC the world's first permanent international criminal court so it could not only address crimes that have happened but also seek to deter further crimes. The Statute lists the crimes under the ICC's jurisdiction and outlined the Court's processes, which aim to hold perpetrators accountable, within a system that ensures fair trials. It allows victims to be heard in the Courtroom and to seek reparations. It is an international treaty that was adopted in 1998, took effect in 2002, and is supported by over 120 countries worldwide.
The crimes the Court seeks to deter
ICC investigations and cases can focus on charges within four main categories of crimes:
Genocide
including genocide by killing; genocide by causing serious bodily or mental harm; and genocide by deliberately inflicting on each target group conditions of life calculated to bring about the group's physical destruction;
War crimes
including, the use of child soldiers; murder; rape; sexual slavery; mutilation; cruel treatment; torture; pillaging; intentionally directing an attack against a civilian population; attacks against humanitarian missions, deportation or forcible transfer of population
Crimes against humanity
including murder; torture; rape; sexual slavery; enslavement; forcible transfer of population; attacking a civilian population; persecution and other inhumane acts
Aggression
The use of armed force by a State against the sovereignty, integrity or independence of another State.
