The United States (US) has escalated its campaign against the International Criminal Court (ICC), imposing sanctions on the court’s president, Japanese judge Tomoko Akane, and senior trial lawyer Abdoulaye Seye of Senegal.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the measures on X, saying the Trump administration was acting to protect Americans from what he called a “sham court after Washington earlier argued the ICC had overstepped its authority by investigating and seeking to prosecute officials from countries that were not members of the court”, including the United States and Israel.
The sanctions freeze any assets the two officials hold in US jurisdictions and cut them off from the American financial system.
The move comes as the sanctions face legal challenges in US courts. Human rights groups and ICC-linked plaintiffs argue that President Donald Trump’s executive order targeting the Court was unconstitutional and interfered with protected human-rights work.
The cases are being heard in federal courts, including in New York and Washington. Human Rights Watch says the latest sanctions are part of an effort to cripple the court and undermine accountability for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The ICC itself has condemned Washington’s action as a “flagrant attack” on the court’s independence, saying threats against judicial officials put the international legal order at risk.
VIDEO | The United Nations and the European Union have condemned attacks on the ICC:
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