US sanctions ICC president, senior trial lawyer on team seeking Netanyahu’s arrest

Rubio slams ‘fatally politicized supranational court,’ which counters that move ‘undermines rule of law’; PM thanks US ‘for making clear corrupt officials who lead ICC will face consequences’

The Trump administration has imposed sanctions on the president of the International Criminal Court and one of its top prosecutors as it continues a campaign to dismantle the tribunal, which it accuses of trying to unfairly prosecute US and Israeli soldiers for alleged crimes in Afghanistan, Iraq and Gaza.

The State Department said Tuesday it had hit ICC president Tomoko Akane, a Japanese national, and ICC senior trial lawyer Abdoulaye Seye, who is from Senegal, with sanctions that freeze any assets they have in US jurisdictions or come into contact with the US financial system.

“The Trump administration has been clear: the International Criminal Court is a corrupt and fatally politicized supranational court that has maliciously abused its authority and exceeded its mandate,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement. “We will not tolerate its assault on state sovereignty.”

The move is the latest by the administration against the ICC, which it says has exceeded its mandate by investigating or trying soldiers, commanders and political officials from countries, such as Israel and the United States, that are not members of the court.

The ICC was quick to respond, as it has done when faced with previous US actions, saying that the sanctions “undermine the rule of law.”

“When judicial actors are threatened for applying the law, it is the international legal order itself that is placed at risk,” it said.

Seye is a senior trial lawyer on the prosecution team that sought an arrest warrant for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and has been nominated for election as an ICC judge.

“The ICC has become a kangaroo court that cloaks its abuse of power in the language of international law while undermining the very principles of justice,” Netanyahu wrote on X in response to the US announcement, hailing Rubio’s “determined efforts against the ICC’s illegitimate overreach, and for making clear that the corrupt officials who lead the ICC will face consequences.”

The US imposed targeted sanctions last year on several ICC officials, including prosecutors and judges, citing ⁠the ICC’s ​arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant, as well as a past probe into US troops in Afghanistan.

The sanctions freeze any US assets the individuals may have and essentially cut them off from the US financial system, with which almost all internationally operating banks have close ties.

The US Treasury Department also issued a general license on Tuesday authorizing the wind-down of transactions involving Akane and Seye through September 17.

Akane warned in December that the US sanctions would “rapidly undermine the court’s operations in all situations and cases, and jeopardize its very existence.”

Three ICC judges sued Trump and his administration in June over the sanctions, arguing the measures were unlawful. Advocacy groups, in two separate lawsuits, have said that the US campaign infringes on the constitutional rights of organizations working with the court to seek justice for atrocities around the world.

Rubio said last month that the administration would step up efforts to undermine the ICC, including a diplomatic campaign aimed at persuading other countries to quit the institution, a call that at least five countries have already heeded.

He accused the court of posing a threat to US personnel carrying out US President Donald Trump’s hardline immigration policies or strikes on boats accused of carrying drugs, as well as other US service members.