MANILA, Philippines — British Judge Joanna Korner has been elected as the presiding judge of the trial chamber that will handle the crimes against humanity case of former president Rodrigo Duterte at the International Criminal Court (ICC).
The newly constituted ICC Trial Chamber III released on Wednesday night (Manila time) a three-page decision notifying parties and the public of the selection of Korner as the presiding judge.
The document was signed by Korner and Judges Keebong Paek and Nicolas Guillou.
The three were earlier assigned by the ICC presidency to form a chamber that will handle Duterte’s case.
Korner, a former judge of the Crown Court of England and Wales, practiced criminal law for more than 45 years prior to her appointment as ICC judge in 2021.
She will serve her nine-year term at the international tribunal until 2030.
According to her profile on the ICC website, Korner has organized and taught on numerous training programs on international criminal law and advocacy for judges and lawyers.
“Between 2004-2005, she was Senior Legal Adviser to the Chief Prosecutor of Bosnia and Herzegovina, during the establishment of a War Crimes Section in the country’s State Prosecutor’s Office,” her profile read.
The other two members, Judges Paek from South Korea and Guillou of France, were both appointed as ICC judges in 2024 and will serve until 2033.
“The Judges of the ICC are persons of high moral character, impartiality and integrity who possess the qualifications required in their respective States for appointment to the highest judicial offices,” the ICC said in an earlier statement.
“All have extensive experience relevant to the Court’s judicial activity. They are elected by the Assembly of States Parties on the basis of their established competence in criminal law and procedure and in relevant areas of international law such as international humanitarian law and human rights law,” it added.
The trial chamber is now expected to hold status conferences and confer with the prosecution, defense and the victims’ representatives to facilitate procedures and the timing of the trial proceedings.
Duterte camp to appeal confirmation of charges
The defense counsel of former president Duterte has requested pre-trial judges of the ICC for permission to appeal their decision confirming the charges of crimes against humanity.
Defense counsel Nicholas Kaufman on Wednesday filed a motion for leave to appeal the April 23 decision of the ICC Pre-Trial Chamber I.
Under ICC’s rules, the prosecution and the defense are not automatically allowed to appeal the pre-trial chamber’s decision on confirmation of charges.
If granted, the motion for leave will authorize the defense to raise their issues before the ICC Appeals Chamber.
Kaufman, in his motion, claimed that there were two appealable issues in the assailed decision.
“Firstly, the Pre-Trial Chamber erred in law by adopting an impermissibly ‘flexible’ approach to the formulation of the charges, thereby diluting the requirement that the accused person be informed in detail of their nature, cause and content,” the defense lawyer said.
“In so doing, the Pre-Trial Chamber relied on irrelevant considerations… which find no basis in the Rome Statute. As such, the Pre-Trial Chamber effectively endorsed an open-ended formulation of the charges, permitting their factual scope to remain undefined and thereby failing to delineate the parameters of the case at the confirmation stage, as required by both practice and procedure,” he added.
Kaufman also claimed that the judges erred in law “by failing to articulate a reasoned evidentiary basis for confirming the charges.”
“It did not link its factual findings to the evidence nor did it engage with central Defense submissions, including the absence of a common plan. Instead, it accepted the Prosecution’s case at face value, without conducting the necessary incident-specific assessment required at the confirmation stage,” it added.
Kaufman said these supposed errors undermine the function of the confirmation procedure.