Impact of the ruling in The Prosecutor v Laurent Gbagbo and Charles Ble Goude on the Common Plan Policy provided for under Article 7(2) of the Rome Statute.

Abstract
A statute or any codified law can be considered to be the bible of its jurisdiction. However, what happens where a verse in the bible is not clear? It is prone to varied interpretations by the religious practitioners. The same is the occurrence in the interpretation of a Statute. The Rome Statute was enacted to provide for the law related to crimes in the international regime. The absence of clarity in the legal provision leads to its various interpretations in the cases heard at the International Criminal Court.. Such is the case in Article 7 of the Rome Statute that provides for the crimes against humanity.
Description
Antonio Cassese states that despite the adoption of the Rome Statute, the international criminal law is still quite rudimentary and lacks specificity.1 This is evident in the provision on crimes against humanity under Article 7 of the Rome Statute. Article 7(1) of the Rome Statute defines a crime against humanity as an act that is committed as part of a widespread attack against a civilian population.2 Subsection 2 of the same, then further expounds on what an attack directed against a civilian population is. It states that it involves the multiple commissions of acts pursuant to or in furtherance of a State or organisational policy to commit the act.
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