Legal Limits on the Application of Article 16 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court by the United Nations Security Council

The relevance of the study is determined by the absence in the Rome Statute of clear substantive legal criteria for the application of Article 16, which provides for the deferral of an investigation or prosecution by the International Criminal Court. The purpose of the study is to determine the legal limits of the United Nations Security Council's discretion in applying Article 16 of the Rome Statute. The article analyzes the provisions of the Rome Statute and the Charter of the United Nations, as well as the practice of applying Article 16 in United Nations Security Council Resolutions 1422 (2002) and 1487 (2003). The study proposes a two-stage model for assessing the legality of the application of Article 16 of the Rome Statute. It distinguishes between the initial request of the United Nations Security Council for the deferral of proceedings and the subsequent renewal of such a request. It is argued that the initial stage requires an assessment of the object of deferral and its connection with Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, while renewal requires a new assessment of whether the relevant circumstances continue to exist.