The fall of a dictator

David Cameron made separate phone calls to President Obama and President Hollande this evening to discuss the situation in Syria. In his conversation with Hollande, the Prime Minister discussed how to ‘build on the non-lethal support recently announced by the UK and agreed that France and the UK would work more closely to identify how they could bolster the opposition and help a potential transitional Syrian government after the inevitable fall of Assad,’ a Downing Street spokesperson said. What will that inevitable fall from power look like? In this week’s Spectator, Douglas Murray argues that the International Criminal Court has changed the way dictators let go of power. In the old days they might have disappeared into exile, but now they see an incentive to hang on to the bitter end, killing thousands more people in the process. He says:

Of course it is justice, but the new international justice puts legal purity ahead of the saving of human lives.