‘NULLUM CRIMEN, NULLA POENA SINE LEGE’ A ZBRODNIE MIĘDZYNARODOWE

Patryk Gacka

doi:10.21697/zp.2021.21.1.06

Published: 2021-03-13

Vol. 21 No. 1 (2021)

‘Nullum crimen, nulla poena sine lege’ and International Crimes

Patryk Gacka

Zeszyty Prawnicze

Section: Artykuły

https://doi.org/10.21697/zp.2021.21.1.06

Abstract

The aim of this article is to address the problem of the moral availability of the law in relation to the standard nullum crimen, nulla poena sine lege, which may be derived from the case law of the European Court of Human Rights and other courts and tribunals in cases concerning the predictability of the unlawful and punishable nature of acts constituting an international crime. Two questions determine the scope of this inquiry. First, I examine to what extent the punishability of international crimes has met the predictability criterion as far as the ordinary addressee of a provision of criminal law is concerned. Secondly, the article raises the question of the extent to which it is justified to rely on an argument on the grounds of the “moral availability” of criminalization to compensate for certain formal shortcomings characteristic of international legislation. In addition, I examine particular criteria of the principle of legality in relation to international crimes. In this respect, I discuss three cases heard by the ECHR (Kononov, Vasiliauskas and Korbely) concerning war crimes, the crime of genocide, and crimes against humanity respectively

Keywords:

the principle of legality; international criminal law; the European Court of Human Rights; the European Convention on Human Rights.

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Gacka, P. (2021). ‘Nullum crimen, nulla poena sine lege’ and International Crimes. Zeszyty Prawnicze, 21(1), 159–194. https://doi.org/10.21697/zp.2021.21.1.06

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