DOHA: Qatar has met with the president of the International Criminal Court as it seeks legal action against Israel over its unprecedented strike on its territory last week, an official said on Thursday.
The emirate’s chief negotiator, Mohammed Al-Khulaifi, met in The Hague on Wednesday with the president of the ICC, Judge Tomoko Akane, as it pursues “every available legal and diplomatic avenue to ensure accountability for those responsible for Israel’s attack on Qatar,” the Qatari official told AFP.
Last week’s deadly Israeli strike targeted Qatar-based leaders of Palestinian militant group Hamas and sent shock waves through the Gulf states that have long depended on the United States for their security.
Hamas has said top officials of its political bureau, hosted in Qatar with US blessing since 2012, survived the strike but it said five members were killed, along with an officer of Qatar’s internal security force.
Speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the discussions, the official called Israel’s attack “unlawful,” adding it “constitutes grave violations of international humanitarian law.”
Qatar, as an observer state at the ICC, cannot itself refer cases to the court.
But after emergency talks in Doha, the Arab and Islamic blocs called on their members Monday to take “all possible legal and effective measures to prevent Israel from continuing its actions.”
In a post on X after his meeting with the ICC chief, Khulaifi said his visit had been “part of the work of the team tasked with exploring legal avenues to respond to the illegal Israeli armed attack against the State of Qatar.”
Last year, the ICC launched a prosecution of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for war crimes and crimes against humanity during Israel’s war in Gaza, including by intentionally targeting civilians and using starvation as a method of war.
The ICC also sought the arrest of Israel’s former defense minister Yoav Gallant and Hamas commander Mohammed Deif, who has since been confirmed killed by Israel.
The Gaza war was triggered by Hamas’s October 2023 attack, which resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory campaign has killed at least 65,141 people, also mostly civilians, according to figures from the territory’s health ministry that the United Nations considers reliable.
Qatar meets ICC head as it mulls legal action against Israel
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Qatar meets ICC head as it mulls legal action against Israel
- Last week’s deadly Israeli strike targeted Qatar based leaders of Palestinian militant group Hamas and sent shock waves through the Gulf states that have long depended on the United States for their security
- In a post on X Qatar's chief negotiator Khulaifi said his visit had been “part of the work of the team tasked with exploring legal avenues to respond to the illegal Israeli armed attack against the State of Qatar”
WHO alarmed by health workers, civilians ‘forcibly detained’ in Sudan
- The WHO counts and verifies attacks on health care, though it does not attribute blame as it is not an investigation agency
GENEVA: The World Health Organization voiced alarm Tuesday at reports that more than 70 health workers and around 5,000 civilians were being detained in Nyala in southwestern Sudan.
Since April 2023, Sudan’s regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have been locked in a brutal conflict that has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced 12 million more and devastated infrastructure.
“We are concerned by reports from Nyala, the capital of Sudan’s South Darfur state, that more than 70 health care workers are being forcibly detained along with about 5,000 civilians,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X.
“According to the Sudan Doctors Network, the detainees are being held in cramped and unhealthy conditions, and there are reports of disease outbreaks,” the UN health agency chief said.
The RSF and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North faction allied earlier this year, forming a coalition based in Nyala.
“WHO is gathering more information on the detentions and conditions of those being held. The situation is complicated by the ongoing insecurity,” said Tedros.
“The reported detentions of health workers and thousands more people is deeply concerning. Health workers and civilians should be protected at all times and we call for their safe and unconditional release.”
The WHO counts and verifies attacks on health care, though it does not attribute blame as it is not an investigation agency.
In total, the WHO has recorded 65 attacks on health care in Sudan this year, resulting in 1,620 deaths and 276 injuries. Of those attacks, 54 impacted personnel, 46 impacted facilities and 33 impacted patients.
Earlier Tuesday, UN rights chief Volker Turk said he was “alarmed by the further intensification in hostilities” in the Kordofan region in southern Sudan.
“I urge all parties to the conflict and states with influence to ensure an immediate ceasefire and to prevent atrocities,” he said.
“Medical facilities and personnel have specific protection against attack under international humanitarian law,” Turk added.
