Fatou Bensouda

Fatou Bensouda Bom ( born January 31, 1961 in Bathurst today Banjul) is a Gambian lawyer and since June 15, 2012 Chief Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. Previously Bensouda was Deputy Prosecutor of the ICC, from 1998 to 2000 she was Minister of Justice in The Gambia.

Study, a lawyer and minister in Gambia

Fatou Bensouda was born in 1961 in Bathurst, the daughter of an official. Her father died of diabetes when she was still a young girl. After attending elementary and high school allowed her a government scholarship pursuing studies at the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University - OAU) in Ile - Ife, Nigeria. After graduating from the OAU she went to the Nigerian Law School in Bwari ( near Abuja ) and from there to the International Maritime Law Institute of the IMO (International Maritime Organization), an institution of the United Nations in Malta. This postgraduate studies she graduated with a thesis on the topic The 1986 United Nations Convention on Conditions for Registration of Ships: An Endorsement of the Open Registry Concept? from. With her ​​knowledge she was Gambia's first expert on international maritime law. After completing her studies, she began her career in 1987 as a prosecutor and senior public prosecutor in the judicial service of their country of origin.

1993 he was appointed as Deputy Director for Bensoudas public accusations in the Office of the Attorney General of Gambia. She became Advocate General and Secretary for Legal Affairs in 1996. Already in 1998, was their appointed Attorney General ( partially comparable to an Attorney General ) and Minister of Justice. During these activities she took over again participated in international conferences on various legal topics.

In March 2000, Bensouda left the state legal service and settled as a lawyer in Banjul. Since January 2002, she was then serves as Executive Director of the International Trade and Industry Bank in Gambia.

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the International Criminal Court

This activity, however it ended after just four months in May 2002, when it was legal advisor to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda ( ICTR). This office she held until her appointment as deputy prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in November 2004. In this position she was elected with 58 votes out of 78 and, beating two rival candidates through. Bensouda was therefore beside the prosecutor Serge Brammertz tasked with investigating more representative of the Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo. The Court is particularly concerned with the method of the " child soldiers " and the prosecution of Thomas Lubanga responsible for it in the Congo.

In November 2011 it was announced that the States signatory to the Rome Statute agreed on the nomination of Bensouda as next Chief Prosecutor of the ICC. Her appointment was filed on December 1. On December 12, Bensouda was elected unopposed to the office.

Background literature

• Kai Ambos: The Role of the International Criminal Court. In: From politics and contemporary history. ( APuZ ). Vol 42, 2006, pp. 10-17 (PDF)
• Esther Mujawayo, Souad Belhaddad: A life more. Ten years after the genocide in Rwanda. Hammer, Wuppertal 2005, ISBN 3-7795-0029-9