Arlen Specter: “Mr. President, I believe that the pending provision in the legislation to encourage the adoption of an international…”

“Mr. President, I believe that the pending provision in the legislation to encourage the adoption of an international criminal court is an important step moving the United States forward in supporting this concept and in trying to bring this idea into reality. I have long been interested in the concept of an international criminal court, as I have watched a number of major international crimes go unprosecuted because of nationalism which has prevented international criminals from being turned over to the United States or to other countries where prosecutions would be obtained. The case in the mid-eighties of Abu Abbas, an international terrorist on the Achille Lauro, is illustrative and has been referred to in part by the distinguished Senator from Connecticut. Abu Abbas was a coconspirator in the hijacking of the Achille Lauro. He was on an Egyptian airliner headed for an Arab country, but the plane was forced down in Italy. There was practically a shootout between Italian authorities and U.S. authorities, because the Italian authorities refused to turn over Abu Abbas to the United States where we had the jurisdiction to prosecute him. He was then turned over by the Italian authorities to Yugoslavia. Ultimately, he was not brought to prosecution until he was tried and convicted in absentia in an Italian court and I believe received a sentence of some 30 years.”