7 The International Criminal Court

The International Criminal Court was established at the Hague in the Netherlands in accordance with the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court that came into effect in 2002 after being adopted at a diplomatic conference hosted by the U.N in 1998. The Court is a permanent international criminal court that can prosecute and punish those who have committed the crime of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression in accordance with international law. It may exercise jurisdiction over these crimes only when the state which has jurisdiction over the case is unwilling or incapable of carrying out the relevant investigation or prosecution (a revision to the Statute that defines the crime of aggression (adopted in 2010) has yet to come into effect, and hence no jurisdiction actually exists yet for that crime). Japan became a state party to the International Criminal Court in 2007, upon which the Act on Cooperation with the International Criminal Court (Act No. 37 of 2007) that provides the procedural provisions for cooperating in investigations, etc. of cases over which the said court has jurisdiction, was enforced.