On 26 September 2018, six American States Parties to the Rome Statute referred the Situation in Venezuela to the Office of the Prosecutor (‘OTP’) of the International Criminal Court, regarding crimes against humanity. Those States rested on Article 14 of the Rome Statute to proceed. That referral – namely, crimes committed outside the territory of the referring State(s) – was the second of its kind received by the icc in its more than 15-year working history. The otp is currently considering the referral under the so-called ‘Preliminary Examination’ stage, wherein the admissibility test is likely to be addressed within the complementarity principle, according to Article 17 of the Rome Statute. Despite the duty to exercise their criminal jurisdiction, as the Preamble to the Rome Statue stipulates, and the fact that those six American States recognize some sort of extraterritorial jurisdiction, those States remained inactive. What should the otp do when six democracies, who are able to act, do not even try to launch an investigation for crimes they have expressed concerns about, without providing an explanation for their inactivity? This article will analyse how the otp should deal with this referral in terms of the complementarity principle, having regard to the positive approach to complementarity. Accordingly, it will be argued that the Prosecutor should refrain from intervening until those States attempt to act and/or, in case of legal or factual inability, justify the referral.

2018 年 9 月 26 日，《罗马规约》的六个美国缔约国将委内瑞拉局势提交给国际刑事法院检察官办公室（“OTP”），涉及危害人类罪。这些国家依据《罗马规约》第 14 条进行处理。这种移交——即在移交国领土外实施的犯罪——是国际刑事法院在其 15 年多的工作历史中收到的第二起此类案件。该OTP根据《罗马规约》第 17 条，目前正在考虑在所谓的“初步审查”阶段进行提交，其中可能会在互补性原则内解决可受理性测试问题。尽管有行使刑事管辖权的义务，正如《罗马规约》序言所规定的那样，而且这六个美洲国家承认某种域外管辖权，但这些国家仍然没有采取行动。当六个有能力采取行动的民主国家甚至不尝试对他们表示关注的犯罪进行调查，而没有对他们的不作为做出解释时，otp应该怎么做？本文将分析otp是如何应根据互补性原则处理这种转交，同时考虑到互补性的积极方法。因此，有人争辩说，在这些国家试图采取行动和/或在法律或事实无能力的情况下，证明移交是正当的之前，检察官应避免干预。