War Crimes Rewards Expansion Act: Policy Analysis

Overview of the War Crimes Rewards Expansion Act

The 1956 State Department Basic Authorities Act (SDBAA) authorizes the Secretary of State to confer rewards of up to five million dollars for information that results in the apprehension or conviction of drug traffickers, organized criminals, and international terrorists. These may be foreign nationals convicted or apprehended in any nation, or by an international criminal court, for perpetrating genocide, war crimes, or crimes against humanity. H.R. 3851 eliminates all ambiguity as to whether such rewards may be used for domestic prosecutions of foreigners in American courts under American legislation — for example, laws that criminalize genocide or war crimes — by adding the phrase "under American law," or an equivalent phrase ("H.R. 3851, War Crimes Rewards Expansion Act" 1).

The above ambiguity would be eliminated by amending the SDBAA and incorporating the provision of rewards for the apprehension or conviction of certain foreigners who have perpetrated war crimes or genocide. This would ensure that the War Crimes Rewards Program (WCRP) is utilized in cases of prosecutions occurring under both domestic and international legislation.

Universal Jurisdiction and the Scope of the WCRP

According to the principle of universal jurisdiction, certain offenses are so atrocious that it must be made impossible for offenders to escape justice by invoking sovereign immunity or the sanctity of national borders (Kissinger 1). The present regulation allows the American government to reward informants who provide intelligence that facilitates the conviction of individuals involved in genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. This initiative has resulted in the capture of fugitives from the Rwandan Criminal Tribunal and the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. However, the law fails to explicitly state that prosecutions occurring under American law — and not only under international tribunal regulations — may also be rewarded. At present, the WCRP specifies only that persons who furnish intelligence resulting in the capture or conviction of perpetrators of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity as defined under international tribunal law may be rewarded.

Clarifying this matter would further the success of the Program and explicitly authorize the State Department to utilize rewards across a broader array of prosecutions. Violent criminals, under particular circumstances, may be prosecuted with maximum impact within national courts, in the affected community where the crime was perpetrated. Such action may maximize public awareness, legal understanding among the parties involved, and witness access to trials.

Justice vs. Peace: Timing War Crime Prosecutions

War crime prosecution timing must take into account the justice-versus-peace debate. According to some experts, if prosecutions risk provoking social breakdown or prolonging armed conflict, they ought to be delayed until the conflict is peacefully resolved; however, not everyone agrees with this view (deGuzman 232). Quite often, societies victimized by mass atrocities have become, at least temporarily, immune to foreign pressure seeking accountability and closed off from the international community. Their leaders may cling to personal ideologies long after doing so has ceased to serve their own interests or those of their people, and they will resist pressure from international entities in order to strengthen their domestic political position.

Nevertheless, the prosecution of such atrocities will likely move more swiftly toward an outcome and invite independent entities to pursue charges, allowing civil society organizations to channel these proceedings into a constructive force for accountability.