International
criminal court condemns Trump sanctions on its staff
Court says
US move is an attempt to ‘harm its impartial judicial work’ and calls on member
states to oppose it
Harry
Davies, Marina Dunbar and Oliver Holmes
Fri 7 Feb
2025 12.14 GMT
The
international criminal court (ICC) has condemned Donald Trump for imposing
sanctions on its staff, which it said were intended to harm vital work to
investigate the world’s gravest atrocities, including crimes against humanity
and genocide.
The US
president signed an executive order on Thursday authorising aggressive economic
sanctions against the ICC and travel bans on its staff, accusing the body of
“illegitimate and baseless actions” targeting the US and its ally Israel.
Trump’s
order cited an ICC-issued arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged war
crimes relating to the Gaza war as a reason for the decision. Netanyahu visited
Washington this week and praised Trump as Israel’s “greatest friend”.
Responding
on Friday, the ICC called on its member states to stand up against sanctions,
describing Washington’s move as an attempt to “harm its independent and
impartial judicial work”.
It said:
“The court stands firmly by its personnel and pledges to continue providing
justice and hope to millions of innocent victims of atrocities across the
world,” and it urged its 125 member states “to stand united” for justice and
human rights.
World
leaders and rights groups have rushed to defend the court. The German
chancellor, Olaf Scholz, criticised the sanctions, which he said would
“jeopardise an institution that is supposed to ensure that the dictators of
this world cannot simply persecute people and start wars”.
The European
Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, said the ICC gave “a voice to
victims worldwide” and it “must be able to freely pursue the fight against
global impunity”.
In London, a
spokesperson for the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, said Britain supported
the independence of the ICC and had no plans to place sanctions on its
officials.
In Geneva, a
United Nations rights body said Trump’s decision should be rescinded. “We
deeply regret the individual sanctions announced yesterday against court
personnel, and call for this measure to be reversed,” said Ravina Shamdasani, a
spokesperson for the UN human rights office.
In his
order, Trump said the ICC had “abused its power” by issuing the warrants for
Netanyahu and his former defence minister Yoav Gallant, which he claimed “set a
dangerous precedent” that endangered US citizens and its military personnel.
Netanyahu strongly applauded Trump’s move, calling it bold.
The ICC was
established in 2002 to prosecute serious crimes committed by individuals when
member states are unwilling or unable to do so themselves. While the US and
Israel are not parties to the statute, their citizens can fall under its
jurisdiction. Israel has other allies such as the UK, Germany and France who
would be obliged to arrest Netanyahu if he were to travel to those countries.
The warrants
for Netanyahu and Gallant were approved by a three-judge panel elected by state
parties, and the prosecutor has also investigated Palestinian militants
including Hamas.
An arrest
warrant has been issued for the Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif, whose
whereabouts are unknown. In 2021, the ICC ruled that it had jurisdiction in
Palestine and could investigate crimes there, despite Israeli objections.
It was
unclear if the Trump administration would announce the names of specific
individuals targeted by the sanctions. ICC officials have prepared for
sanctions to affect senior figures at the court including its chief prosecutor,
Karim Khan.
Amnesty
International’s secretary general, Agnès Callamard, said the order “sends the
message that Israel is above the law and the universal principles of
international justice”.
She said on
Thursday: “Today’s executive order is vindictive. It is aggressive. It is a
brutal step that seeks to undermine and destroy what the international
community has painstakingly constructed over decades, if not centuries: global
rules that are applicable to everyone and aim to deliver justice for all.”
Other
activists said imposing sanctions on court officials would have a chilling
effect and run counter to US interests in other conflict zones where the court
is investigating.
Charlie
Hogle, a staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union’s national
security project, said: “Victims of human rights abuses around the world turn
to the international criminal court when they have nowhere else to go, and
President Trump’s executive order will make it harder for them to find justice.
“The order
also raises serious first amendment concerns because it puts people in the
United States at risk of harsh penalties for helping the court identify and
investigate atrocities committed anywhere, by anyone.”
After ICC
judges issued the arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant in November,
the court braced itself for retaliatory moves by the incoming Trump
administration. Officials at the court, which is headquartered in The Hague,
fear the sanctions could pose an existential threat to the judicial body.
Several ICC
sources told the Guardian last month that sanctions against senior court
figures would be difficult but manageable, but institution-wide sanctions would
pose an threat as they would block the court’s access to services on which it
depends to function.
In 2020,
under a separate but similar executive order, Trump imposed travel bans and
asset freezes on the ICC’s former prosecutor Fatou Bensouda, who is Gambian,
and one of her top officials.
The measures
were launched in response to decisions made by Bensouda in war crimes
investigations in Afghanistan and the occupied Palestinian territories. At the
time, Bensouda was conducting a preliminary inquiry into allegations of crimes
committed by Israel’s armed forces and Hamas.
In 2021,
Bensouda upgraded the case to a formal criminal investigation. Khan inherited
the inquiry and later accelerated it after the Hamas-led 7 October attacks and
Israel’s ensuing destruction of Gaza.
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