Bhutto, Saddam, Hariri: The travails of international criminal “justice”

I want to second the judgment that Pat Lang expressed over at his blog today, to the effect that there is no prospect of any independent international investigation into Benazir’s killing.
Hillary Clinton– you remember her, she’s the one who keeps touting her claimed “experience” in governance, including foreign affairs– has been making a big deal on the campaign path of issuing strident calls for just such an investigation. The potent sub-text there being that no-one can believe the credibility of any investigation organized solely by the Pakistani authorities.
Well, yes and no– though the speed and vigor with which Hillary launched her call for an international investigation looked, in itself, highly politicized and confrontational.
But Lang is quite right to say that no such investigation will be convened. Who would do it? The only possible authorizing body with any legitimacy would be the Security Council, and there are four governments with veto power there– perhaps even five– that would almost certainly block any attempt to embarrass Pres. Musharraf at this time.
Which is of course very different from Lebanon, 2005, where Pres. Lahoud had no staunch, veto-wielding supporters to cover his back on the SC.
Lang was quite correct to write,

Bottom Line: Crimes like these are really matters of international politics, and the large countries’ interests still govern. All else is just illusion. International law? A pretty conceit. The strong still are strong.
There will be no effective international investigation into Bhutto’s death.

And while we’re on the subject of internationally launched criminal investigations and other criminal proceedings, let’s: (a) remember that today is the first anniversary of the ghastly travesty of the execution of Saddam Hussein, conducted by a kangaroo court that was convened under the eager and highly politicized auspices of the US military occupation; (b) look at how incredibly divisive, inconclusive, and partisan the SC’s Hariri investigation has turned out to be; and (c) review the record of all the other criminal proceedings the international “community” has launched over the past 14 years…
It is very hard indeed to conclude that these proceedings have had a constructive record, on balance, either in deterring the future commission of atrocities– sometimes in the very same countries where the indicted/convicted miscreants operated– or in institutionalizing norms of accountability and good governance in the countries targeted by them.
All the people in the international community who continue to root for “international” or internationally-launched criminal proceedings that turn out not to be responsible to anything resembling a democratic polity, and not to bring about the promised policy outcomes (as listed above), should reflect carefully on– and seek to learn from– the disastrous record of the Saddam trial.
Especially every year on December 30.