'The Trial of Henry Kissinger' by Christopher Hitchens

Since its inception in 2002, International Criminal Court has heard 18 cases in eight countries, all of which are countries in Africa.

There're growing outrage especially in Africa that ICC is "hunting only Africans".

The validity of this allegation aside, the breadth and its legal reach of ICC is hopelessly limited.

That's because it can't bring to justice anyone whose country is not a signatory to Rome Statue.

That includes the United States, China, Russia, Indonesia among others, the countries that have a long history of engaging in dubious, in many cases, appalling criminal statecraft.

In this seminal book, polemicist Hitchens reveals a formidable case against Kissinger for a crime against humanity and other illegal conducts during his role as a senior security advisor to Nixon, and as a Secretary of States.

Here he focuses on a limited number of instances that have irrefutable official evidence against Kissinger, that are now in public domain.

They include East Timor, Pakistan, Greece, Cyprus, Chile, Argentina, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam...

I regard this book and his effort to indict Kissinger in court, as one of Hitchens' greatest achievements, along with his support for Salman Rushdie during Iranian Fatwa saga.

Unlike many other public intellectuals, he was a man of action, not just a man of words.

His wish to see Kissinger in the dock before his untimely death was in vain, and in realty, we will never see it happen.

"The current state of suspended animation, however, cannot last.
If the courts and lawyers of this country will not do their duty, we shall watch as the victims and survivors of this man pursue justice and vindication in their own dignified and painstaking way, and at their own expense, and we shall be put to shame.”