Al Jazeera on Tuesday said it has filed a lawsuit at the International Criminal Court against Israeli forces over the killing of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was shot during an Israeli raid in the West Bank in May.The lawsuit following an investigation by the television news network's legal team, Al Jazeera said on Twitter.The ICC must identify the individuals who were directly involved Abu Akleh's killing, Al Jazeera lawyer Rodney Dixon KC told a news conference in The Hague on Tuesday.
This is a joke.
There is no such thing as a "lawsuit" at the ICC. Al Jazeera cannot initiate any sort of legal action at the ICC. Only the UN Security Council, a state party to the ICC, or the ICC prosecutor can initiate any action at the ICC.
The ICC only is tasked to prosecute four war crimes: genocide, crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and the crime of aggression of one state against another.
All Al Jazeera did was send a letter to the prosecutor. They made it look like a big deal, flying a group to the Hague to hand in the envelope, but that it all they did.
You can write to the prosecutor, too: otp.informationdesk@icc-cpi.int. It doesn't mean anything.
The prosecutor has no obligation to do anything just because he received a letter. Sending a letter that will be ignored is hardly newsworthy.
In other words, this is nothing more than a publicity stunt on the part of Al Jazeera.
As usual, the media just parrots Al Jazeera's press release as if it is real news, without asking a single international law expert what this means.
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