Commentary [on Judgement in Situation in Central African Republic, Prosecutor v. Bemba Gombo]

On its face, this represents a clear-cut approach to the issue of, in particular, pre-trial detention, and appears to be in accordance with generally accepted principles of international human rights law relating to the right to liberty and the presumption of innocence. However, despite the obvious overlap that may be evident in the factual circumstances that may come before the ICC and those that related to a violation of human rights principles by a state, the former is a very different type of court from, for example, the European Court of Human Rights. In other words, the ICC is not a human rights court, but rather is an international criminal court, a principal function of which involves the determination of the guilt or innocence of an individual(s) accused of committing crimes that “deeply shock the conscience of humanity”.