Interaction of International and Iranian Law in Criminalization of the  Use of Chemical Weapons'

World is approaching the 12th anniversary of the Chemical Weapons Convention's (CWC) entry into force. This Convention together with the NPT and Biological Weapons Convention form an important part of international law of armed conflict and disarmament. The progressive development and codification of this branch of international law has created obligations for all States to criminalize, try and punish war criminals. Particularly, after the adoption of the Statute of International Criminal Court (ICC), States have demonstrated more readiness to incorporate this crime into their domestic legal systems. The use of chemical weapons in wartime is also among the crimes, which may fall within the jurisdiction of the ICC. Iran has not yet ratified the Statute of the ICC. Should it decide to accede, in the light of the principle of ‘complementarity’ and considering the rule of ‘rejection of foreign dominance’ or Nafy-e Sabil in Islam, it would much more need to take note of necessity of criminalization of the use of chemical weapons. Currently, the country is under obligation by the 1949 Geneva Conventions and the 1993 CWC to make use of such weapons criminalized, though has not yet done so. Furthermore, there is no conflict between its criminalization and the Islamic principles. There are even instances of prosecution and punishment of war criminals in the Islamic jurisprudence. Moreover, criminalization of the use of chemical weapons would support the strength of customary international law on the subject and the Iranian courts would have jurisdiction to prosecute criminals who may commit this crime in Iran.