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International Law, National Self-Interest or Neither?

by Noah Carl
30 November 2024 5:00 PM

European countries’ decision to sanction Russia, their main energy supplier, has consistently been defended based on the principle that they must uphold the “rules-based international order”.

In a statement defending the sanctions in February of 2022, the German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock said that “this war is an attack against all the values of a rules-based international order” and that “we are standing up here for international law and international rules”.

In a communiqué defending the sanctions in May of 2022, G7 foreign ministers stated that “Russia has blatantly violated the rules-based international order, international law and humanitarian principles and it has breached universally agreed and legally binding fundamental principles”.

And in an article defending the sanctions in July of 2022, the EU’s foreign policy chief Joseph Borell noted that “allowing Russia to prevail would mean allowing it to destroy our democracies and the very basis of the international rules-based world order”.

Now, the “rules-based international order” is a rather slippery concept. One can distinguish two broad definitions: a charitable one, and a cynical one. The charitable definition is that it refers to the rules, norms and laws laid down by various multilateral organisations, such as the United Nations, the World Trade Organisation and the International Monetary Fund. The cynical definition is that it refers to U.S. global domination. (The truth is probably somewhere in between.)

Under the charitable definition, the International Criminal Court in the Hague represents a key element of the “rules-based international order”. It is therefore no surprise that European countries applauded the ICC’s decision to issue an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said the ICC is the “the right institution to investigate war crimes”, while the French government said “no one should escape justice”.

What is noteworthy is how France and Germany have responded to the ICC issuing an arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu.

After initially stating that it would implement the court’s ruling, France subsequently backtracked, arguing that Netanyahu has immunity because Israel is not a signatory to the Rome statute. (This backtracking apparently followed an angry call from Biden to Macron.) Of course, if Netanyahu has immunity, as France claims, then so does Putin – since Russia is not a signatory to the Rome statute either.

Germany’s response has been similarly muddled. A spokesman initially stated, “I find it hard to imagine that we would carry out arrests in Germany” because of the country’s “historical responsibility”. (Germany apparently has a “historical responsibility” in light of the Holocaust but does not have one in light of Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union, which killed about 20 million Russians.) However, Baerbock subsequently stated that “nobody is above the law”. Friedrich Merz, who is likely to be the next German Chancellor, has previously suggested he would not implement the ruling.

So on the one hand, France and Germany are willing to sabotage their own economies by sanctioning Europe’s main energy supplier in order to uphold the “rules-based international order”. Yet on the other, they are not willing to say they will implement a simple ICC ruling, even though there is no economic cost to doing so and their refusal undermines the court’s authority.

It seems that France and Germany are neither upholding international law nor pursuing national self-interest. What they are doing remains unclear. My best guess is: what the U.S. tells them.    

Tags: International Criminal CourtRules-based international orderSanctions

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13 Comments
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huxleypiggles
huxleypiggles
5 months ago

International law does not of course exist as I have posted frequently but it is a useful mechanism for the globalists to drag out when they are not getting their own way. Kneel of course just lurves international law because it allows him to suck up (😲) to the Davos Deviants and provides him with the illusion of being in the big boys club.

An especially useful measure when controls not normally available are required.

17
0
NeilParkin
NeilParkin
5 months ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

They used to say that the top guy in the organisation had a sign on his desk, ‘The buck stops here’. This isn’t true. With International Law, the Buck rests momentarily on his desk before being passed to some unelected legal official who will make the ‘Hard Decision’ (Trade Mark), allowing the Top Guy to shrug his shoulders and say that we have to uphold international law even though he isn’t happy about it. It is a distraction, and little more, and an easy point at which to get exactly what they wanted and let the scapegoat take the blame.

6
0
Mogwai
Mogwai
5 months ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

It doesn’t exist in Syria. Some terrible footage being shared from over there as psychopathic ISIS rebels execute Syrian soldiers by shooting or beheading them, so I won’t show any of that, but we do have many ISIS/Jihadi supporters in Europe so they’re out celebrating;

https://x.com/DaveAtherton20/status/1862959779695714629

https://x.com/NiohBerg/status/1862913965858181551

Last edited 5 months ago by Mogwai
3
0
Mogwai
Mogwai
5 months ago
Reply to  Mogwai

This is not looking good for any minorities over there;

https://x.com/NiohBerg/status/1862850867306606724

4
0
GlassHalfFull
GlassHalfFull
5 months ago

“Now, the ‘rules-based international order’ is a rather slippery concept. One can distinguish two broad definitions: a charitable one, and a cynical one. The charitable definition is that it refers to the rules, norms and laws laid down by various multilateral organisations, such as the United Nations, the World Trade Organization and the International Monetary Fund. The cynical definition is that it refers to US global domination. (The truth is probably is probably somewhere in between.)

Come off it Noah it is most definitely the latter.

The US, neoCons and Zionists run the world and that is why they will do everything in their waning power to stop the Global South and the BRICS+ multipolar world from overthrowing their hegemony.

The US, their vassals and the dollar will soon be toast and the world will be a much better place for it.

4
-6
Sforzesca
Sforzesca
5 months ago
Reply to  GlassHalfFull

The simple truth is that the bastardised Banking Families of the West ie The RPTB ( mostly of a certain ethnicity) have run their course.
Their only way to salvation is chaos, death and destruction so they can rise from the ashes.
And chaos is what we have in Spades.
Putin freed Russia of the Rothschilds – so, we have Ukraine, net zero/CO2, and the dash to digital control – to save the planet. How very laudable of them.
And the sheep will fall for it.

Last edited 5 months ago by Sforzesca
6
-3
GlassHalfFull
GlassHalfFull
5 months ago
Reply to  Sforzesca

I would happily see Russia freeing the UK and the West from the clutches of the banking ethnic cartel and the puppets they install in governments to administer their agenda.

6
-3
Insurrectionist
Insurrectionist
5 months ago
Reply to  Sforzesca

“The RPTB ( mostly of a certain ethnicity) have run their course.”
Don’t mistake that our economic demise is also their’s..
It’s far from the truth, let me assure you, they are fully in control, and it’s all going to plan…

Last edited 5 months ago by Insurrectionist
3
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RW
RW
5 months ago
Reply to  GlassHalfFull

As the saying goes: Brazil has always been the country of the future.

4
0
RW
RW
5 months ago

You’re best guess is probably right for Germany. But the rules-based international order always had its rules applied rather selectively. Eg, firebombing of cities is supposedly a war crime. But this didn’t stop a from monument being erected to honour the British soldiers who did nothing but that during WWII and no US strategic air warfare general was ever persecuted for that, either.

A really cynical interpretation of rules-based international order is that the rules are really historically as follows:

  1. Nothing Britain, the USA or Israel does in a war is ever a war crime.
  2. Whatever Germans did, it’s always criminal.
  3. For the rest of the world, it depends on whom they’re allied with and whom they’re targetting.

IOW, that the term rules based international order is really hogwash: It’s a bunch of ‘rules’ countries who won a certain war made up to use them against their erstwhile enemies with a lot window dresssing applied to hide that to some degree.

Last edited 5 months ago by RW
6
-1
CGW
CGW
5 months ago
Reply to  RW

As Napoleon supposedly quoted, history is written by the victors.

Last edited 5 months ago by CGW
5
0
RW
RW
5 months ago
Reply to  CGW

As I’ve recently learnt, the rules based international orderists actually arrested the former German crown prince for “war crimes in the first world war” after the second and – since they had really no idea what they could possibly charge him with – essentially kept him in housearrest until is death from a ‘heart attack’ fairly soon afterwards.

Last edited 5 months ago by RW
2
0
RTSC
RTSC
5 months ago

Since it’s all about “the Rules-based International Order” and National Leaders’ being accused of invading countries and murdering innocent civilians, I wonder why Blair isn’t the subject of an ICC Arrest Warrant?

Two-Tier “Rules” and “justice” in operation at the ICC? Surely not.

5
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