The right to a fair trial at international criminal courts and tribunals – Are the standards of international criminal proceedings fair enough?

Abstract

Since the establishment of the first ad hoc criminal tribunals and from the creation of the Inter- national Criminal Court, there has always been a discussion whether these international courts and tribunals are obliged to set the highest standards of fairness in their procedural practices, or whether it is sufficient if their proceedings and practice is just ‘fair enough’. In essence, the hu- man rights framework cannot be neglected when assessing the fairness of international criminal proceedings. As the fair trial provisions of the human rights framework inspired the international criminal courts and tribunals‘ own standards, as well as the recent trends show that international criminal courts and tribunals draw on international human rights jurisprudence in their own inter- pretation of those standards, the aim of this article is to explore whether the standards of fairness of the international criminal proceedings are set high enough to ensure compliance with the inter- national human rights framework. The article focuses on providing a brief overview and a short comparative analysis of the standards of fairness at the selected international criminal courts and tribunals. It primarily explores the interplay between the international human rights framework and the statutory framework of the international criminal courts and tribunals, by examining the existing international human rights legal framework, and exploring the understanding and inter- pretation of standards of fairness, with an emphasis on the equality of arms principle as given by the jurisprudence of the international criminal courts and tribunals.