For some time now, the so-called universal justice or universal jurisdiction has been a recurring issue in the Spanish media, and rightly so. Why this interest, now and suddenly, to limit at all costs the universal jurisdiction that allows any State to judge certain crimes that cry out to humanity regardless of the nationality of the offender, the victim, the place of commission or any other link that usually determines the skill of a court?

Universal justice had been for decades a peaceful issue, almost as much as the fact that the purchase and sale is a contract of exchange of a thing for a price. Since 1985, Spain had had a fairly advanced regulation on universal jurisdiction, considered by many to be a world reference. award It had even been praised and supported by the Constitutional Court itself, in its famous ruling on the resource case brought by the Nobel Peace Prize winner, Rigoberta Menchu, in the case of the crimes in Guatemala. In 1998, Judge Baltasar Garzón, with Spanish law in hand, put Augusto Pinochet himself in checkmate when he was in the United Kingdom, which revolutionized international justice: on our planet, this was the message, not everything is valid and not everything is justified for dictators. Little by little, Spain became a jurisdictional refuge for so many victims of conflicts unjustly forgotten by the international community. It was precisely this that began to generate diplomatic tensions with so many countries such as China, Israel, but most particularly with the United States. This is where the crux of the matter lies.

The United States is a serious country that protects its citizens, especially if they have rendered concrete services to the nation. It was common knowledge that former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, a powerful man like few others and still active despite being over ninety years old, was particularly upset since 2002, when Baltasar Garzón requested information from Interpol about his upcoming trip to London. Garzón had Kissinger in his sights as a possible ideologue and the last manager of the repressive plans of the famous Operation Condor. This prevented the American politician from trotting around the world with the ease and freedom with which a man of his international relevance does. And he began to move.

A year later, in January 2003, Garzón openly criticized the U.S. government for the detention of Al Qaeda suspects in Guantanamo Bay. Those were years in which relations between Spain and the United States functioned perfectly thanks to the friendship between Aznar and Bush. The United States then had its back well covered in Spain. The problem of universal jurisdiction, therefore, although important, was a minor topic for the Bush administration. Things changed with the victory of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero in the 2004 general elections. After the withdrawal of Spanish troops in the Iraqi conflict, bilateral relations between Spain and the United States cooled. Bush and Zapatero, let us not forget the flag affair on October 12, 2003 when he was head of the civil service examination, distanced themselves from each other. As a result, the issue of Spain's broad regulation of universal jurisdiction began to cause serious concern in the USA.

It was at that time when, from U.S. authorities, a plan was devised to remove Judge Garzón from the National Court by trying to promote his candidacy for a post in an international court, with more limited competencies (i.e., without universal jurisdiction). knowledge But the ideologues ran into the eternal Hispanic problem: the lack of sufficient English language skills to access one of these international positions. From this perspective, Garzón's controversial stay at the King Juan Carlos Center at New York University, during the 2005-2006 academic year , can be better understood. Garzón's presence in the Big Apple made it easier for Kissinger to meet with him. This happened at the famous dinner, which made the press for various reasons, on December 15, 2005 at the Spanish tapas restaurant called Solera, between 53rd Street and Third Avenue in Manhattan. Kissinger must have been quite relaxed after sharing a friendly tablecloth, among others, with the Spanish judge who had so often disturbed his sleep.

On March 17, 2009, two months after Barack Obama took office, a lawsuit was filed before the Audiencia Nacional against the former Attorney General of the United States and other advisors of the Bush administration for having elaborated a rules and regulations that allowed justifying torture in the legal limbo of Guantanamo. The complaint did not sit well with the Obama administration. For this reason, from instances close to the US Government, conversations were held with some politicians, both from the PP and the PSOE, well connected internationally, to force the modification of the law of universal jurisdiction. The result, due to the power and good contacts, was very fast. Soon after, in compliance with the mandate emanating from congress of the Deputies, came the reform by law 1/2009, of November 3. Only a few months later, Kissinger, calm and triumphant, visited Spain for attend to the meeting of the Bilderberg Club in Sitges.

With the fall of Zapatero and the arrival of Rajoy to power, things became much simpler for U.S. diplomacy. In his first visit to the United States in January 2014, Mariano Rajoy was treated with the highest honors. A few days later, the controversial reform of universal justice was initiated, processed as a matter of urgency, with the aim of approve new restrictions as soon as possible. It is not surprising, therefore, that the 2014 reform has caused so many tensions in our country. However, it will have mattered little in the United States.

As a jurist, one may or may not agree with agreement with the principle of universality of justice. I am, of course, but I also believe that universal jurisdiction, as it stands today, is obsolete. The new international community born of globalization, by nature interdependent, cannot and should not function with the same rules of the game as the old Westphalian international community, based on the principle of sovereign independence. We are facing a paradigm shift, which imposes new models and much more effective systems for the prosecution of crimes that damage global legal assets.

The United States of America is willing to lead the peace process in the world, to take its troops wherever necessary to defend democratic principles, but it is not willing, in any way, for its politicians and soldiers to run the slightest risk because a judge in a remote corner of the world, appealing to the principle of universal jurisdiction, can prosecute them criminally. For this reason, the United States does not look favorably on the International Criminal Court or anything like it either. This may be liked or disliked, but it is not surprising. The United States has bet, in my opinion wrongly, on a globalization led by them, based on the principle of exceptionality, legitimized after the Second World War. And they are being consistent with their policy.

Rajoy, cautious and thinking of Spain's interests, has probably taken the best possible solution: to get closer to the United States and, to this end, among other measures, to further restrict universal justice. His argument is reasonable: let every stick (read State) hold its candle. In the event that justice does not work in a State, the burden should be shared subsidiarily among the entire international community, and not only fall on a specific country, in heroic fashion, as has so often been the case up to now. The Audiencia Nacional cannot become a national court for international cases. Therefore, universal jurisdiction must be restricted in our era of globalization, although it may seem a paradox. But not in any way.

The two recent reforms of universal jurisdiction in Spain have obeyed fundamentally political criteria, to reasonable pressures coming mainly from the United States. Both reforms have entered the legal system through the back door. By stealth. And, as politicians have become accustomed to, without the people having full information. We live in this democracy.