“ARE WINNERS JUDGED”? WAR BETWEEN AMERICA AND EUROPE (RESUME)

MARI TSIKLAURI

Half a year passed since George Bush has made a speech in the American Congress about the inevitability of force action in Iraq in view of reliable information on the attempts of Iraqi regime to purchase raw materials in Africa for the production of nuclear weapon. The White House had to recognise that head of administration used forgery.

Democrats do their best to use the “African uranium” story in order to make a blow at George Bush’s reputation and to reduce his empyreal rating that began to decrease (according to the recent Pew Research Centre for the People and Press, Bush’s rating fell from 74% to 60% by the early July). Research shows that discontent with the solution of internal problems by the US President has grown, too.
If George Bush’s rating is still high, his ally, British prime-minister Tony Blair turned out to be in much more difficult situation. Results of social opinion polls recently published by the agency Populus by the order of The Times indicate at significant fall of prime-minister’s and labourists’ popularity. The old proverb “winners are not judged” does not have any decisive significance in this case. Moreover, International Criminal Court was formed in Europe specially for clearing out whether winners used legal methods for reaching the victory.
Agreement on the formation of International Criminal Court was signed in 1998 by representatives of 138 states. This agreement came in force in July last year and it was ratified by 90 countries.
The US signed agreement on the formation of ICC at Clinton’s administration, but Bush’s administration has recalled the signature. Russia signed the articles on 13 September 2000, but has not yet ratified it.
The main purpose of ICC is to bring to justice people of different ranks that are guilty of felony. At the same time, ICC does not intend to interfere with the national legislature of states. One of the principal tasks of ICC is harmnisation of national legislations with the articles of ICC. We should note that in this case if the Security Council authorises ICC to hold investigation of this or that crime, it would not need the agreement of the country whose citizen is the guilty person no matter whether the country signed the agreement on the formation of ICC or not.
In short, after the formation of ICC American citizens, first of all, militants who took part in peacekeeping operations, run the risk of being brought to justice one day. Americans who have always judged others with pleasure object to being judged by anyone else.
It is not surprising that Washington does its best to protect its citizens from ICC.
As the ICC already exists and America can hardly avoid this fact, it tries to convince each party that to recall signatures of the ICC fomation agreement; it warned them that otherwise it would leave them without military aid totaling 4 billions per year.
Thus, if after the war in Balkans someone still doubted the American leadership in the world, the Iraqi operation should finally convince everyone of it. Overthrow of Hussein without UN sanctions made America think that the 90-year rivalry with UN has finally been won. After the allies occupied Iraq, the only thing for the UN to do was to keep silent and after a certain pause to take resolution on peaceful restoration of the country.
Since the beginning of ICC work, this victory has once again been thrown into doubt and reminded us of the fact that the world dispute about hen and egg has not yet finished. It is, first of all, important for Georgia itself whether it will take sides with America or Europe as America is our closest friend and at the same time, we aspire to integration in Euro structures.
In this background, the fact that Iraqi businessmen have allegedly taken interest in co-operation with Georgian colleagues is of great interest. In particular, the matter concerns production of company “Kazbegi” (cold tea, cigarettes), which once again confirms that policy is policy while business is business .