Miriam leaves for New York to campaign for ICC seat

MANILA, Philippines - Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago will continue her campaign for a seat in the International Criminal Court (ICC) during a visit to the United Nations headquarters in New York.

Santiago leaves for New York today for the second leg of her campaign tour, after her tour to The Hague in the Netherlands.

Santiago will personally meet with the ambassadors based in New York to campaign for one of six seats available in the ICC.

There are 19 candidates vying for the six seats in the ICC, two of which are from the Asian region, including Santiago.

Santiago is also one of two female candidates, the other being Olga Venecia Herrera Carbuccia of the Dominican Republic.

Santiago, with the support of the Department of Foreign Affairs, has also been lobbying for the post in the Philippines. 

The DFA hosted a luncheon for Santiago in Makati City yesterday with 21 honorary consuls in attendance. All them are assigned to countries that have ratified the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

The Philippines recently ratified the Rome Statute, becoming the 117th state party to the treaty.

These countries are Belize, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Costa Rica, Croatia, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Gambia, Guinea, Honduras, Iceland, Ireland, Lithuania, Mali, Malta, Peru, Senegal, Serbia, Slovenia, Uruguay and Zambia.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario gave clear instructions to the consuls to actively campaign for Santiago, which would be a significant achievement, not only for the country, but for developing nations as well.

“Asia is a region that has only 17 state parties in the ICC. Asia needs to be better represented in the court. Developing countries need to be better represented in the court,” Del Rosario said.

He added that women also need to have better representation in the court, considering that a lot of the cases brought before it involve violence against women.

Del Rosario noted that former Chief Justice Cesar Bengzon was the last Filipino to have ever held a position in an international court.

Bengzon served in the International Court of Justice from 1967 to 1976.