Group calls for proper enforcement of ICC rulings as Trump administration widens attacks on court
The US threat to impose sanctions on the international criminal court (ICC) as an institution, not just its leading judges, could fundamentally disrupt its operation and needed to be resisted, a coalition of countries to defend international law heard at the United Nations on Friday.
Ronald Lamola, South Africa’s foreign minister, issued the warning at an event during the UN general assembly called to protect the system of international law from a growing array of threats, including open flouting of its tenets and rulings by Israel.
The meeting was organised by the Hague Group, of which Lamola is co-chair, and which was set up in 2025 to protect international law and to call for the proper enforcement of the rulings of its two primary bodies: the ICC and the international court of justice (ICJ).
Lamola told the gathering that the US had already sanctioned ICC judges and prosecutors, but was now planning sanctions against the ICC itself.
“If imposed, such measures could fundamentally disrupt its operations,” he said. “An independent court remains independent only if judges and officials cannot be punished for carrying out their mandates.”
The head of the ICC, Judge Tomoko Akane of Japan, was sanctioned by the US in August, along with senior trial lawyer Abdoulaye Seye of Senegal, for engaging in the ICC’s efforts to “prosecute officials whose government has not consented to ICC jurisdiction”. The attack on Akane was condemned this week by the Japanese prime minister, Sanae Takaichi.
The US has admitted it seeks to dismantle the Hague-based ICC. In his address to the UN general assembly this week, Donald Trump once again criticised the “out of control” court, which he smeared as an “evil group of people” and urged other nations to reject.
The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has accused the court of being “a corrupt and fatally politicised supranational court that has maliciously abused its authority and exceeded its mandate. We will not tolerate its assault on state sovereignty.”
The next step by the US is likely to be to impose secondary sanctions on anyone who cooperates with the court, as opposed to sanctioning its senior judiciary. A designation of the whole institution would reach every European bank, insurer and technology supplier serving the court, which sits in the Netherlands.
The Dutch government, as the host of the ICC, is taking the lead in trying to warn the US away from the effective immobilisation of the court. The Dutch prime minister, Rob Jetten, told the UN general assembly: “International law either works for everyone or for no one. This court was established to protect us against impunity and it was built on the foundations of the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials. And now, with the ICC under attack, the writing is truly on the wall.
“After all, how can you possibly be opposed to prosecuting the very worst crimes? And I believe there can be only one response: to say, hands off the ICC and all those other institutions that protect the international legal order.”
William Schabas, a specialist in international law, noted to the meeting the irony that the resort to international law and courts was increasing dramatically even as the institutions were under attack. He said nations needed to strengthen the ICC, including by ensuring positions are not traded and only the highest calibre judges are elected.
Diana Buttu, the prominent Palestinian lawyer, was among many to complain of western powers’ partial resort to international law. “The greatest threat to international law is not the state that openly defies it,” she said. “The greatest threat is our selectivity – the quiet decision that is made in capitals and rooms that the rules don’t bind everybody, they only bind some. It is the belief that we can excuse some because they are our allies, our partners and our friends.”