ICC prosecutor won't back down on Sudan's Bashir

By Louis Charbonneau

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court on Thursday said he would not back down from his call for the arrest of Sudan's president for genocide, but the U.N. secretary general said the court must consider the possible impact of its investigations.

ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo has accused Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir of a campaign of genocide that killed 35,000 people outright, at least another 100,000 through a "slow death" and forced 2.5 million to flee their homes in Sudan's western Darfur region.

He asked the ICC on Monday to issue an arrest warrant for Bashir on suspicion of genocide and other crimes against humanity. Sudan has dismissed Moreno-Ocampo's accusations as politically motivated and said it will ignore any warrant.

China, South Africa and others have expressed concern that an indictment of Bashir could damage the stalled peace process aimed at ending the 5-year-old conflict in Darfur.

Moreno-Ocampo, in his first public comments since asking for Bashir's arrest, said this was not a factor for him.

"I am the prosecutor and I have to do my judicial part of the work for the court," he told reporters. "I kept my independence and I cannot be a political factor," he said when asked whether arresting Bashir would harm peace negotiations.

ICC judges are expected to make a decision on whether to issue a warrant for Bashir's arrest in October or November

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon offered a different view, saying the ICC also must consider ramifications of its work without sacrificing its independence.

"We must seek to strike the correct balance between the duty of justice and the pursuit of peace," he said.

Moreno-Ocampo, who was visiting the United Nations to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the signing of the Rome Treaty that created the ICC, also denied there was any link of the timing of his high-profile call to the anniversary.

'GATE OF FIRE'

Diplomats have said that Khartoum might retaliate against an ICC arrest warrant for Bashir by withdrawing its consent for the U.N.-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur if the Security Council does not intervene.

Sudan's U.N. ambassador, Abdalmahmoud Abdalhaleem, has said he is working with Russia, China and members of the African Union and Arab League to persuade them to ask the U.N. Security Council to freeze any ICC indictment against Bashir.

Diplomats in New York say the Arab League and the AU's Peace and Security Council are expected to call on the U.N. Security Council soon to block any ICC moves in the interests of bringing peace to Darfur.

Several Western diplomats on the council have said Bashir could escape indictment if he ended what they see as impunity for two men the ICC charged last year over Darfur. Khartoum has not handed them to the court or started legal proceedings in Sudan to investigate the allegations.