القاعدة ذات الصلة
Italy
Practice Relating to Rule 151. Individual Responsibility
Italy’s IHL Manual (1991) states that individual criminal responsibility for those who commit a war crime is provided for under Italian law.
Italy, Manuale di diritto umanitario, Introduzione e Volume I, Usi e convenzioni di Guerra, SMD-G-014, Stato Maggiore della Difesa, I Reparto, Ufficio Addestramento e Regolamenti, Rome, 1991, Vol. I, § 83.
Italy’s Wartime Military Penal Code (1941) provides for the punishment of a list of various offences related to wartime activity.
Italy, Wartime Military Penal Code, 1941, Articles 167–230.
In the Priebke case in 1996, Italy’s Military Tribunal of Rome found a German soldier and former member of the “SS” guilty of multiple first-degree murder charges, acts which it qualified as war crimes, for his role and participation in the 1944 Ardeatine caves killings when 335 persons (both civilians and members of the armed forces) were killed in reprisal for the killing of 33 German soldiers. The Tribunal considered the reprisal to be disproportionate to the acts which had led to the reprisal, and Priebke was found responsible for having drawn up a list of the names of the victims to be killed, for having checked the identity of the victims being transferred to the place of the killings, and for having shot two of the victims himself. However, the Tribunal found that the accused could not be punished for reasons of statute of limitations.
Italy, Military Tribunal of Rome, Priebke case, Judgment in Trial of First Instance, 1 August 1996.
On appeal, the judgment was annulled by the Supreme Court of Cassation and another trial ordered.
Italy, Supreme Court of Cassation, Priebke case, Judgment Cancelling Verdict of First Instance, 15 October 1996.
In the Hass and Priebke case in 1997 dealing with the same events as in the Priebke case, Italy’s Military Tribunal of Rome found the accused guilty of multiple charges of aggravated murder for their respective roles in the reprisal killings. It sentenced the accused for war crimes to imprisonment.
Italy, Military Tribunal of Rome, Hass and Priebke case, Judgment in Trial of First Instance, 22 July 1997.
In its relevant parts, the judgment was confirmed by the Military Appeals Court and the Supreme Court of Cassation, although the Courts settled on life imprisonment.
Italy, Military Appeals Court, Hass and Priebke case, Judgment on Appeal, 7 March 1998; Supreme Court of Cassation, Hass and Priebke case, Judgment in Trial of Third Instance, 16 November 1998.
In the Ercole case in 2000, Italy’s Tribunal of Livorno tried and sentenced a former paratrooper to 18 months’ suspended imprisonment for abusing his authority during his participation in a multinational peacekeeping operation in Somalia and, pending the outcome of connected civil proceedings, made him provisionally liable to the payment of 30,000,000 Italian lire to a Somali citizen who had been tortured.
Italy, Tribunal at Livorno, Ercole case, 13 April 2000.
However, in 2001, the Court of Appeals at Florence declared that a crime of abuse of authority was covered by statutory limitations.
Italy, Court of Appeals at Florence, Ercole case, 22 February 2001.
In the Ercole case in 2000, Italy’s Tribunal of Livorno tried and sentenced a former paratrooper to 18 months’ suspended imprisonment for abusing his authority during his participation in a multinational peacekeeping operation in Somalia and, pending the outcome of connected civil proceedings, made him provisionally liable to the payment of 30,000,000 Italian lire to a Somali citizen who had been tortured.
Italy, Tribunal at Livorno, Ercole case, 13 April 2000.
In 2001, the Court of Appeals at Florence confirmed the judgment in this part.
Italy, Court of Appeals at Florence, Ercole case, 22 February 2001.
