Mr Chairman.

First of all, I wish to congratulate you for your election to chair this Conference. We hope that the progress which will be realized under your leadership will be fundamental in  order for us to achieve successfully the objectives we have laid before us for the International Criminal Court. Likewise, Mr. Chairman. I  wish to transmit in the name of my government our appreciation to the Government of Italy for having offered to host this meeting.

I also wish to express my deep gratitude to Mr. Adriaan Bos, of the Netherlands, who with great dedication and efficiency presided over the preparatory work of this conference.

Mr. Chairman:

The examination of the international criminal responsibility of an individual constitutes an important progress of international law and of international society. In a global world, each time more planetary and communicated, international law, should make fundamental strides, with greater consolidation and efficacy. In past centuries. the slow speed of communications and interchange did not foster a more dynamic progress of international law. But, anyway, its principles were gradually consolidated - though many of its aspirations found difficulties and took too long to be accepted - and they have finally begun to appear as a practical necessity for world peaceful coexistence.

What at a given time appeared to be an utopia or illusion of visionaries has been transforming itself into a concrete and effective reality. A lot yet needs to be done, and that is why we are here, in Rome, before the testimony of many centuries of history and of progress of legal ideas, to affirm our faith in the future of the international rule of law, of the principles of justice, which are also simultaneously expressions of the ethical progress of humanity. Notwithstanding the difficulties posed by the diversity in legal systems and the need to consider them in the statute in a balanced way with the principles and concepts of domestic law, we must give proofs of wisdom through the needed flexibility, in the consultations and negotiations which we will hold in these sessions, in order to achieve a balanced text.  Many are the interests, the points of view and the visions of the problem which one must try to harmonize.

For this reason, this conference should be characterized for its flexibility, for its spirit of compromise, for its practical sense, so that we may obtain real progress which will be measured and proven with time.  We should not expect the immediate consolidation of everything that we aspire. But it is legitimate and reasonable that we should try to obtain advances which will show the effectiveness of international institutions and express to the world that we are definitively advancing towards the objectives of a more peaceful humankind and a more organized coexistence.

This realism, this vision of the future, must fight for a universal acceptance and growing consensus with regard to principles. Not everything that ideologists aspire to, nor everything that visionaries perceive is obtainable immediately. But effective political action can lead, is to obtain that aspirations be measurable in tangible results, in concrete deeds in favour of the international good, which is nothing less than the public interest in its planetary dimension. My country, Venezuela, has supported from the beginning the process of creation of this new court, having participated actively and constructively in the special meetings held since 1994, when the General Assembly considered the draft statute prepared by the International Law Commission and particularly in the. Working Group  met in 1995 and the Preparatory Committee which held sessions in the period 1996-1998. The new Court should be established with urgency and should be founded on the principle of complementarity.

Complementarity, however, must be absolutely clear in the norms to be approved in this conference. We must aspire to the greatest autonomy, the greatest permanency, the greatest universality. On this will depend its effectiveness in the fulfillment of its fundamental goals.

The fate of an institution, whose historical urgency is not necessary to demonstrate, will depend on the political will achieved here and the common effort which we may mobilize over the next days. World violence, which disorders human coexistence in different geographic regions. is demanding a greater effort of political will and of decisive action on the part of states to better organize life in our planet.

My country is concerned, most of all, about the autonomy and independence of the Court. Its moral force and practical value will depend on having this. That has been the position of my country. We have held that the competency of the Court should be decided by itself, in the exercise of a faculty established in international law to the effect that every court should decide about its own competency.

The necessary autonomy of this new organ should not only be viewed from the jurisdictional point of view, but also from the functional point of view, which irnplies budgetary autonomy, as a constituent part of its independence.

It should not be necessary to add that the obvious consequence of the above is that the Court should have a permanent character.

The objectives of this conference do not constitute an abstract convenience. We are dealing with a concrete challenge, in favor both of international peace and of harmonious human coexistence.

Among the considerations in this conference, not the least of its aspects is the fact that, due to the nature of the principles which influenced the creation of the Court, it is necessary that the Court exist before the crimes which it must eventually punish. Practical necessities have led to the establishment of ad-hoc tribunals and they constituted an effort of the international community to face immediate challenges. But, in a long historical projection. which would strengthen the principles of international law, we should aspire to the consolidation of a valid and effective institution such as the one we are intent on creating here.

I have a special interest in indicating this aspect of the problem, because I have had the honouring distinction of being elected in 1993, by the Security Council of the United Nations, International Prosecutor for the crimes committed in the, former Yugoslavia. I thus have firsthand knowledge of the growing determination, both of the Security Council as of the other organs of the United Nations, to give a more organic form to the instruments of international legality. And, in my own particular case, I have a deep motivation to express my enthusiasm for the initiative to establish an International Criminal Court, as autonomous, independent and effective as is possible. Due to very special personal circumstances I finally was not able to accept the appointment made to me. But that did not diminish my faith in an institution such as the one we hope to create in this conference.

Two important facts stand out in the agenda of this conference. On the one hand, it is fundamental that the Court have autonomy and independence; on the other, and as a consequence of the former, it is indispensable that the nature of the functions. responsibilities and competence of the Prosecutor be supported by the greatest independence possible. We will have to be realistic in tile pursuit of these objectives and take into consideration the different interestwhich prevail in the interriational community. But we will also have to be idealists aild demanding. so as not to create institutions without clout and without real content which, instead of leading a way to progress in international law, will diminish faith in institutions and in principles.

At the end of the Second World War, an international equilibrium and system was created whose ideals and imperfections have constituted, and continue to constitute, the frame of reference and action for the international community.  We have to act within that historical context. We should not go beyond nor stress its potential effectiveness. But we also should not underestimate the capacity and energy which is accumulated in the heart of the system. Ours should be, in this conference, a concrete determination to activate those muscles, awaken those nerves, and animate thus the spirit of a more harmonious and better organized coexistence which will permit the realization of the fundamental goals of the human condition.

Finally, it will be necessary to devote particular attention to the activities for the Maintenance of Peace and Securitv.  We cannot and should not compromise their efficacy. It will be necessavy to listen with attention and prudence to the observations that have been made so that, on the one hand, we preserve the efficiency and possibility of these operations and the Security Council can continue to act rapidly and effectively -particularly at a time of significant perturbations in different continents- and, on the other hand, human rights are not violated.

This is an affair of high wisdom, demanding flexibility and compromise. And it also has a high ethical and emotional content. We must conduct ourselves within this context of constraints, but also of ideals and possibilities. To create an invalid institution, without creative force and without political will, would amount to a useless exercise that would not be forgiven by international public opinion and which would betray the ideals of that, ever more assertive, intemational civil society which has turned into an actor and interlocutor in world politics.

I do not want to conclude these words without referring to the contribution which a very important man from the twentieth century has made to some of the initiatives that we are now undertaking. I refer to Telford Taylor, who has just passed away in New York, Professor Emeritus of Columbia University, who was the international prosecutor at the war crimes trials of Nuremberg. His books, his thoughts, his experience, his great questions, can constitute a stimulus for our reflexions and initiatives of today.