Nuremberg trial and international criminal law

1. Nuremberg trial and international criminal law

2. Nuremberg trials

Series of thirteen trials conducted to punish Nazi
leaders.
Held at Nuremberg, Germany in 1945-46
Trial conducted by allied forces: America, Russia,
France and United Kingdom
Former Nazi leaders were indicted and tried as
war criminals by the International Military
Tribunal
No earlier precedent for international trial of war
criminals, earlier prosecutions of war criminals
were held according to the laws of a single
nation.

3. Nuremberg trials

The Major War Criminal’s Trial (1945-46)- best called
Nuremberg Trial was trial of major war criminals.
The trial included- prosecutor and defense attorney,
decisions were imposed by a tribunal rather than a
single judge.
Each of the 4 allied powers supplied two judges- one
main judge and an alternate.
Trial saw introduction of instantaneous translation.
24 individuals were indicted and 6 Nazi organizations
were declared criminal.
As a result of the trial, all defendants except 3 held
guilty, 12- sentenced to death, 1-absentia and rest
were sentenced imprisonment for years or for life.

4. Nuremberg trials

Subsequent Trials- following the major war criminal’s
trials there were additional 12 trials held at
Nuremberg from Dec 1946 to April 1949.
These trials were conducted before U.S. Military
Tribunal instead of International Tribunal.
These trials included the trials of Doctors- accused of
crime against humanity, conducted medical
experiments on the prisoners of war, Judges trialJudges and Lawyers charged for furthering Nazi plan,
German Industrialist- for using slave labor, High
Ranking Army Officials- atrocities against prisoners,
Schutz Staffel officers- violence against
concentration camp inmates.
Out of 185 people indicted – 12 received death
sentence, 8- life imprisonment, 7- imprisonment for
variant length.

5. The London Agreement

The International Military Tribunal derived its
authority from the London Agreement signed on
August 8, 1945 by United States, Soviet Union,
Provisional Government of France and the United
Kingdom.
The Agreement included charter for International
Military Tribunal to conduct trial of Major war
criminals.
The London Charter was the first successful attempt
to carry trials at a supra-national level.
Article 6 of the charter provide IMT with the
jurisdiction to prosecute the accused charged with
Crime against peace, Crime against humanity and war
crimes.
The tribunal could declare an organization as criminal
organization and could hold an individual liable for
being a member of such organization( Article 9&10)

6. The nature of offences

Crime against peace: planning, preparation,
initiation, waging of war of aggression, war in
violation of international treaties agreements
War crimes: violation of laws or customs of war,
such violations include murder, ill treatment ,
deportation to slave labor or any other purpose;
murder, ill treatment of prisoners of war or
persons on the seas, killing hostages, plunder of
public or private property, destruction of cities,
towns or villages
Crimes against humanity: murder, extermination,
enslavement, deportation and other inhuman
acts committed against civilians before or during
the war, persecutions on political, racial and
religious grounds.

7. aftermath-

The Nuremberg trial has been a great influence in development
of international criminal law.
One year after the Nuremberg trial UN passed General Assembly
Resolution 177 in order to codify the Nuremberg Principles, they
were adopted them on July 29, 1950.
The Nuremberg Principles are:
- Whoever commits an act which constitutes a crime under
international law is responsible and therefore liable for it.
- The fact that domestic law doesn’t provide penalty for an act
considered crime under international law doesn’t relieve any
person from the liability.
- Person committed the crime acted as a head or government
official doesn’t relieve him from liability under international law.
- Fact that person acted as per order of govt. or a superior is no
defense provided he always had a moral choice.
- Any person charged with crime under international law has right
to fair trial.
- Crime punishable under international law: crime against peace,
war crimes and crime against humanity.
- Complicity in the commission of a crime under international law
is considered a crime.

8. The aftermath

Tribunal also established that crimes against
international law are committed by men and
not by abstract entities
Nuremberg Trial served as model for:
- The Genocide Convention, 1948
- UDHR, 1948
- Nuremberg Principles, 1950
- The Convention on abolition of the Statue of
Limitation on War Crimes and Crime against
Humanity, 1968
- The Geneva Convention, 1949 and its
supplementary protocols.

9. After the war, the Allies faced the task of cleaning up the aftermath and punishing war criminals.

This marked the first time
leaders would be criminally
charged for their actions
during a conflict.
Rules for international
military tribunals had to be
prepared especially for this
trial, and it set a precedent
for the many to follow soon
after.

10. The Location

The city of
Nuremberg, Germany
was chosen as the
location for the trials.
Once the site of huge
Nazi Party rallies, it
would now bring to
justice the former
leaders of that party.
The seat of the
international military
tribunal was kept in
Berlin to appease the
Soviets.

11.

The Palace of Justice was where
the trials were held. It required
extensive renovations to repair
the building so the trial could be
held. Luckily, this building was
one of the few to escape major
damage in the Allied bombings
of Nuremberg during the war.

12. The Prosecution

United States Supreme
Court Justice Robert
Jackson was chosen as
the United States’ chief
prosecutor in the trial.
Roman Rudenko was the
chief prosecutor for the
Russians.
Sir Hartley Shawcross
was the British
prosecutor.

13. The Judges

Francis Biddle – Former
U.S. Attorney General and
American justice on the
court.
Henri de Vabres
Donnedieu – French
justice on the court.
Sir Geoffrey Lawrence –
British justice and
president of the court.
Ion Timofeevich
Nikitchenko – Major
general of jurisprudence
and Soviet justice on the
court.

14. The Trial

The defendants all faced
The trial lasted 218
days and included
charges related to the
testimony from 360
atrocities committed by
Nazi Germany during the witnesses.
war.
1. Conspiracy to commit Verdicts were
crimes against peace
announced on Sept.
2. Planning, initiating and 30 and Oct. 1, 1946.
waging wars of aggression
3. War-Crimes
The executions were
4. Crimes against
all carried out on Oct.
humanity
16, 1946 in the old
Not all defendants faced
all charges.
gymnasium of the
Nuremberg prison.

15. The Defendants

Twenty two Nazi leaders
were tried, including one,
Martin Bormann, in absentia
after not being found. He
was later discovered to have
died in 1945.
These were all top ranking
Nazis, with trials of lower
ranked criminals occurring
later resulting in thousands
of sentences being handed
out.
Twelve of those tried at
Nuremberg were given the
sentence of death by
hanging, including Martin
Bormann.

16. Hermann Goering

Reichsmarschall and Chief
of the Air Force
He was Hitler’s heir
apparent until days before
the war’s end when he fell
out of favor.
He was sentenced to
death by hanging but
committed suicide using a
cyanide pill three hours
before his sentence could
be carried out.

17. Hans Frank

Governor-General of
occupied Poland
Sentenced to death
by hanging, and
executed on October
16, 1946.

18. Wilhelm Frick

Minister of the
Interior
Sentenced to death
by hanging, and
executed on October
16, 1946.

19. Alfred Jodl

Chief of Army
Operations
Sentenced to death by
hanging, and executed
on October 16, 1946.
In 1953 a German
appeals court found him
not guilty of breaking
international law but…
it was a little late.

20. Ernst Kaltenbrunner

Chief of Reich Main
Security Office
whose departments
included the
Gestapo and SS.
Sentenced to death
by hanging, and
executed on October
16, 1946.

21. Wilhelm Keitel

Chief of Staff of the
High Command of
the Armed Forces
Sentenced to death
by hanging, and
executed on October
16, 1946 despite
request to be shot
as a soldier.

22. Alfred Rosenberg

Minister of the
Occupied Eastern
Territories
Sentenced to death
by hanging, and
executed on October
16, 1946.

23. Fritz Sauckel

Labor leader
Sentenced to death
by hanging, and
executed on October
16, 1946.

24. Arthur Seyss-Inquart

Commisar of the
Netherlands
Sentenced to death
by hanging, and
executed on October
16, 1946.

25. Julius Streicher

Editor of the newspaper
Der Sturmer and
Director of the Central
Committee for the
Defence against Jewish
Atrocity and Boycott
Propaganda
Sentenced to death by
hanging, and executed
on October 16, 1946.

26. Joachim von Ribbentrop

Minister of Foreign
Affairs
Sentenced to death
by hanging, and
executed on October
16, 1946.

27.

Three of the remaining
ten defendants were
acquitted of all charges:
Hans Fritzsche, Hjalmar
Schacht, and Franz von
Papen.
Albert Speer, Baldur von
Schirach, Konstantin von
Neurath, and Karl Dönitz
all were given between 10
and 20 year prison
sentences.
Erich Raeder, Rudolf Hess,
and Walther Funk were all
given life sentences.
Erich and Walther were
both released early,
Rudolf died in prison.

28. Later Trials

Following the
Nuremberg trial came
many smaller trials of
German and Japanese
war criminals.
Other war criminals
who escaped were
brought to justice
through the efforts of
Nazi hunters and
Israel’s Mossad.

29. TOKYO TRIALS: JUSTICE ACHIEVED?

30. International Military Tribunal of the Far East (IMTFE)..

An international tribunal composed of eleven different
countries,
The aim was to bring justice to victims. Doing so by,
reckoning with the past. This is was said to pave the way for
a
peaceful
and
democratic
Japan.
Strongly
influenced
by
Nuremberg
Trials
Active role in compiling important historical records, that
documents were crucial to the trial for identifying individuals
guilty of human rights violations (The Japanese government
had attempted to burn these files before the occupation)

31. Main Accusations:

Crimes against Peace
Murder
Conventional war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Ill treatment of POW

32. THE TRIAL

Predictably, there were opposition to these accusations…
The Japanese government denied the responsibility for the Nanjing
Massacre
(while admitting the events took place, there was the refusal to
take responsibility for such events)
Denial of conspiring to dominate the Asia-Pacific region.
(although evidence revealed that this had been a major since 1928,
when it became part of the Japanese government policy)

33. VERDICT

The Japanese military, along with it's supporters(conspirators), were
found guilty of serious war crimes and atrocities.
Responsibility was given to leaders who had either 'secretly ordered
or willfully permitted' such atrocities
Individuals involved were charged with crimes against peace
Out of the fifty-five separate counts of crimes, the number was
reduced to seventeen

34. MAIN QUESTION: WAS THE IMTFE SUCCESSFUL IN ACHIEVING THEIR CLAIMED GOAL?

Goal : To bring justice to victims, To reckon with the past which was
said to pave the way for a future peaceful and democratic Japan.
Contemporary Japan in fact is more or less a peaceful democracy,
but do the Japanese credit the IMTFE for this outcome ?

35. A DIVIDED PUBLIC OPINION

Leftwing Liberals: Thankful for the IMTFE. Credited them for unveiling
truth, claiming they were a major force of a democratic and
demilitarized Japan. Yet felt that the IMTFE should have done more to
pursue postwar justice
Rightwing Conservatives: Strongly opposed.
Resent the IMTFE being the cause of Japan s label as a criminal nation.

36. GROUNDS FOR OPPOSITION

The tribunal choose to ignore:
Emperor Hirohito was not called trialed
Major human rights violations of China (such as: Human
experiments conducted by Unit 731, alleged use of
biological and chemical warfare)
Wartime sufferings of the Japanese colonial subjects in
Korea and Taiwan
Those imprisoned by the IMTFE were pardoned by 1956,
when the US sought Japan as an ally in the Cold War.

37. Outcome: Partial Justice

The points listed for the grounds for opposition raise suspicion for
hidden motives of the IMTFE.
The Tokyo Trials resulted in symbolic closure, yet it can not be
proven that their involvement created a real tangible difference.