Great Expectations: The Implementation of the Rome Statute in Italy

This article first explores whether Italy is under an obligation to implement the Rome Statute that it ratified in 1999. It then identifies the general sets of inconsistencies between Italian legislation and the Rome Statute and analyses whether and to what extent the former needs to be amended or integrated in order to implement the substantive provisions of the latter, in particular in relation to the definition of crimes, general principles of criminal responsibility, defences and other bars to prosecution. Finally, the exercise of jurisdiction by Italian courts over crimes in the Rome Statute is discussed in the light of the principle of complementarity on which the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court is based. Mere dreams, mere dreams! W.B. Yeats, Meditations in Time of Civil War, I (1928)