On the Minimum Age of Criminal Responsibility in International Law

Abstract

Due to direct participation of children in hostilities and the possibility of committing war crimes by children it is necessary to address the issue of the criminal responsibility of the child in international law. One of the key aspects is the minimum age of such responsibility. The aim of the article is to study whether children might be prosecuted by international or internationalized criminal courts. To achieve this goal, the author applied both general scientific (analysis and synthesis, deduction and induction) and private methods (formal legal, comparative legal and historical legal). Analysis of international treaties, travaux préparatoires and the case law of international and hybrid criminal courts leads to the following conclusions. The majority of international treaties either do not contain a special rule on the minimum age of criminal responsibility or set out framework provisions. There are certain grounds for recognizing 15 years as the minimum age of criminal responsibility in international law. At the same time, due to various circumstances (in particular, the «straight 18» policy, exclusion from the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court for persons under 18), the prospects for international legal regulation of these relations are difficult to predict.