NAME- SHAURYA RAI

PRN- 19010126246
DIVISION- C (4TH YEAR) BBA. LLB
SUBJECT- INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL LAW
ASSIGNMENT- 1ST INTERNAL ASSESSMENT (RESEARCH PAPER)
THEME- INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL PROSECUTION and TRIAL
TOPIC- THE IMPACT OF THE NUREMBERG TRIALS on INTERNATIONAL
PROSECUTION and DEFENCE
INTRODUCTION and BACKGROUND
The Hague Conference in 1899 and again in 1907 attempted to govern warfare on the cusp of the
twentieth century, but their efforts were limited by ideas of State sovereignty. “The Hague
Convention nowhere defines such actions [methods of waging war] as criminal, nor is any
sentence prescribed, nor is any reference made to a court to try and punish violators, as the
Nuremberg judges noted in 1946.”1
During the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 following the end of the 1st World War, the
Commission of Responsibilities first suggested the creation of an international tribunal to
prosecute political leaders accused of international crimes2.
The Pact of Paris of 1928 – officially the General Treaty for Renunciation of War as an
Instrument of National Policy3 – is a 1928 international agreement on peace in which signatory
states promised not to use war to resolve "disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or of whatever
origin they may be, which may arise among them4".
Multiple offences that were criminal under international law were listed in the London Charter.
Four counts were cited in the verdict, all of which came from the London Charter: conspiracy to
wage aggressive war, crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. War
crimes, the third category, were a well-known idea in international law. The Charter provided the
legal foundation for the notion of a crime against peace, for which the top figures responsible for
the outbreak of World War II were convicted and executed at the Nuremberg Tribunal and
Tokyo Tribunal5.

1
Cited by Andres Clapham in From Nuremberg to The Hague: The Future of International Criminal Justice, Philippe
Sands, Cambridge University Press, 2003, p. 31
2
"Commission on the Responsibility of the Authors of the War and on Enforcement of Penalties." The American
Journal of International Law 14, no. 1/2 (1920): 95-154.
3
Kellogg–Briand Pact 1928, Yale University

4
League of Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 94, p. 57 (No. 2137)
5
Kelly Dawn Askin (1997). War Crimes Against Women: Prosecution in International War Crimes Tribunals. p. 46.
ANALYSIS
The Nuremberg Trial’s validity came under scrutiny, especially when it came to charging the
accused with Crimes of Aggression. The argument behind this was that one can’t apply a law
that did not exist when the accused took the actions for which they stood at trial.
All arguments pertaining to these lines were overruled citing the charges will stand as per the
charter and couldn’t be changed at will. It was stated that all the atrocities happened because the
German leaders engaged in lawless acts of aggression. Therefore, charges against all the
defendants were justified.
Yet, it was argued by the defence that was no legal ground for the charges imputed to the
accused. Germany did sign the Pact of Paris of 1928, which clearly stated that all signatories
agreed to condemn war as a means of settling international disputes. It agreed to condemn war as
an instrument of national policy. However, the Pact didn’t provide any legal ground for
criminalising war and it didn’t suggest any penalties nor did it say anything about the
responsibility of the leaders as individual perpetrators.
The argument was discarded citing the paramountcy of the Charter. Charging the accused under
various categories was allowed by the Charter. The legitimacy of the Charter wasn’t called into
question. It is my opinion that the Charter advocated what step was right for humanity to take.
The defence argued that the principles of law must be upheld. And that all German leaders
should be acquitted of all charges for the law they were being tried under did not truly exist then.
They would be right when they argued that in domestic law, people can’t be tried for actions that
were not crimes at the time those men took actions. But as I mentioned earlier in the paper,
International Law evolves under extreme circumstances.
The Paris Convention made it quite clear that waging aggressive war was illegal but there was no
agreement in the Pact that individuals should be held responsible.
The Nuremberg Bench held the view that it is time for the international community to mature
enough to the stage where it has the authority to criminalise aggressive war or punish individuals
who waged such a war. The Court also reiterated that strong laws were needed to prevent future
war as was not done following the end of the Great 1st World War.
They established a precedent that everyone can be held personally responsible for their actions
during times of war, regardless of their standing. Accusants cannot escape personal
accountability by pointing the finger at the nation or administration whose directives they
followed when committing a specific war crime.
The Nuremberg trials proved that people cannot escape responsibility for war crimes by
claiming that they were merely carrying out orders from a higher-ranking official. According to
the Nuremberg principles, it is unlawful to issue orders to engage in aggressive warfare, break
accepted military conventions and laws, or to punish civilians and captives6.

6
International Military Tribunal (1947). Trial of the Major War Criminals. 42 volumes Nuremberg, Germany.
The trials described the types of war crimes that are sanctioned by international law, including
crimes against humanity, crimes against peace, and transgressions of the treaty- and other
agreement-based transnational commitments. These crimes were not clearly defined before to the
Nuremberg trials, and those who committed them had never been sentenced by an international
court.
In Resolution 95(I) of December 11, 1946, the UN General Assembly reaffirmed the "Principles
of International Law Recognized by the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal." Both the Draft
Code of Crimes against the Peace and Security of Mankind, which was adopted by the
International Law Commission, and the 1974 UN General Assembly resolution defining
aggression with regard to state responsibility further examined the illegality of aggression 7.

CONCLUSION
International criminal law was established by the Nuremberg trials, a field that is continually
evolving. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), the United Nations Genocide
Convention (1948), and the Geneva Convention on the Laws and Customs of War (1948) were
all impacted by the ideas that emerged during the Nuremberg trials (1949). A helpful precedent
was also provided by the International Military Tribunal for the trials of Japanese war criminals
in Tokyo (1946–48), the trial of Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann in 1961, the creation of tribunals
for war crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia (1993), and Rwanda (1994).
In 2018, political scholars Michael Fowler and Julie Bunck contended that the trial was:
"An important early foray towards multilateralism... International law emerged to limit the use
of force through legal constraints. It became illegal to take land by force through conquest, and
individuals who did so could face criminal charges on an individual basis. Nuremberg Trial's
criminalisation of waging an aggressive war contributed to the emergence of a new standard of
conduct in international relations, a standard that still influences the contemporary international
system ".

7
P. Kirsch, Applying the Principles of Nuremberg in the International Criminal Court. Wash. U. Global Stud. L.