In June 2026, the International Nuremberg Principles Academy (Nuremberg Academy) published the research report “From Ambiguity to Clarity: Revisiting the Document Containing the Charges to Expedite Proceedings at the International Criminal Court”. Prepared by Professor Dr Christoph Safferling, Dr Gurgen Petrossian and Dr Pablo Gavira Díaz, the study examines how the document containing the charges (DCC), a central procedural instrument of the International Criminal Court (ICC or Court), affects the efficiency and fairness of proceedings before the Court. Building on previous research concerning delays in ICC proceedings, the report analyses fourteen ICC cases and identifies structural, legal and evidentiary features of the DCC that contribute to prolonged and unpredictable pre-trial proceedings.

The report concludes that targeted standardisation —not a rigid template, but clearer expectations on structure, factual precision and separation from evidentiary submissions— can materially improve the DCC’s function as a notice document and enhance procedural efficiency. While standardisation cannot remedy systemic constraints such as delayed cooperation or the breadth of ICC investigations, it can enhance clarity, limit unnecessary amendments and support the confirmation hearing’s role as a reliable gatekeeping mechanism. The report formulates a series of practical recommendations aimed at strengthening charging practice within the existing framework of the Rome Statute.

The publication forms part of a broader research initiative launched following the adoption by the German Parliament (Bundestag) on 26 June 2018 of the resolution “Strengthening the International Criminal Court”. Among other objectives, the resolution called for an examination of the factors contributing to the - often-protracted – length of proceedings before the ICC and requested the Federal Government of Germany to develop proposals with a view to improving the Court’s efficiency. 

In response, the Nuremberg Academy and the International Criminal Law Research Unit of Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (ICLU) conducted a joint research project on the length of ICC proceedings, developing an analytical framework and assessment methodology to identify structural, procedural and institutional causes of delay. The resulting report, titled “Length of the Proceedings at the International Criminal Court”, was submitted to the Federal Government of Germany in 2022 and presented at the twenty-first session of the ICC Assembly of States Parties in The Hague in December 2022 and at the German Parliament in Berlin in October 2023. (pg)