The law took effect in 1993 and was expanded the following year after 10 Belgian soldiers were killed in Rwanda. The law reached prominence after the Rwandan genocide. According to the Washington Post, the process of prosecution of Rwandans in Belgium for crimes committed in the violence were set in motion by Martine Beckers, a Brussels resident, whose sister Claire called her to tell her of being attacked by soldiers, who soon after killed her, her family, and 10 other villagers who were unable to reach a United Nations peacekeepers' compound.
Universal jurisdiction
Countries have long claimed jurisdiction over nationals of other countries or suits against countries themselves in matters Civil or criminal where those foreign nationals are alleged to have committed crimes against the complaining country's nationals, or have committed crimes in the complaining country. What made this Belgian law controversial was that it afforded the right to anyone to submit a war crime for prosecution in Belgian courts that occurred anywhere in the world, whether on Belgian territory, and whether a Belgian national was involved as either criminal or victim. This concept called universal jurisdiction, or universal competence, was recently used in Germany to indict high-ranking US officials for their involvement in prisoner abuse in the war on terror under the command responsibility.
Problems with implementation of the law
The law soon ran into trouble when a number of parties worldwide filed cases criticized as politically motivated against leaders of various nations. Over the years filings included cases against American officials, including George H. W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, Norman Schwarzkopf and Tommy Franks. Cases had also been filed against the leaders of many other countries, such as Iraq and Israel, and Cuba's Fidel Castro. The paperwork backing several of these filings was very limited, consisting out of a single fax or several pages. Critics assailed the law as an attempt to circumvent the sovereignty of other states and become a venue for partisan show trials of propaganda value but no legal consequence. Proponents respond by arguing that universal jurisdiction is often the only recourse victims of war crimes have, and that under the UN Charter countries are already obliged to prosecute those involved in war crimes. In an effort by the United States to pressure Belgium, United States Secretary of DefenseDonald Rumsfeld threatened to remove the NATO Headquarters from Brussels unless the Law was changed.
Most cases dropped
On 12 July 2003, the incoming government of Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt announced that scrapping this law would be among the first acts carried out. In September of that year, the Belgian Court of Cassation threw out the cases against the former President Bush and other US officials, as well as Israelis.
Modified law and criticism
Six human rights groups called that loss of the universal jurisdiction component "a step backwards in the global fight against the worst atrocities." Human Rights Watch outlined the reduced scope of the law:
