The International Criminal Court (ICC) has said it “deplores” new US sanctions on its judges and prosecutors.
On Wednesday, the US State Department announced new sanctions on two judges and two prosecutors in the ICC for engaging in efforts to prosecute US and Israeli citizens.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio accused the ICC of being a “national security threat” and “an instrument of lawfare” against the US and Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has welcomed the US move. The ICC has issued arrest warrants against Netanyahu and his former defence minister, Yoav Gallant, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity over Israel’s war in Gaza.
France also joined the ICC in denouncing the US move, expressing “dismay” as one of its judges, Nicolas Guillou, was among those sanctioned.
The three other ICC officials named by the US are Judge Kimberly Prost of Canada as well as Deputy Prosecutors Nazhat Shameem Khan of Fiji and Mame Mandiaye Niang of Senegal.
Rubio condemned the court’s “politicisation, abuse of power, and illegitimate judicial overreach” in a statement announcing the sanctions.
The ICC is a global court with the power to bring prosecutions for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
The court called the latest sanctions “a flagrant attack” against its independence and impartiality.
“They constitute also an affront against… the rules-based international order and, above all, millions of innocent victims across the world,” it added.
France’s foreign ministry criticised the sanctions as “in contradiction to the principle of an independent judiciary”, the AFP news agency reported.
Meanwhile, Israeli PM Netanyahu welcomed the decision, calling it a “firm measure against the mendacious smear campaign against” Israel.
According to the US State Department, Gillou is being sanctioned for authorising arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant.
The US said Prost, the Canadian judge, is sanctioned for an investigation into US personnel in Afghanistan, adding that Khan and Niang are both responsible for “illegitimate actions against Israel”.
The penalties mean that any property and interests the four officials hold in the US are blocked.
This latest round of sanctions comes after the US imposed similar restrictions on the ICC’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan KC, along with four other judges earlier this year.
UN’s human rights chief previously demanded the US withdraw its sanctions on the four judges, saying the decision runs directly counter to “respect for the rule of law”.
In July, the US also sanctioned UN Human Rights Council special rapporteur Francesca Albanese, who has been a prominent critic of Israel’s military offensive in Gaza.
Rubio cited Albanese’s support for the ICC and her participation in the court’s decisions to prosecute American or Israeli nationals as justification for the move.
In response, Albanese reposted support for the ICC on social media, saying she came from the court’s founding country Italy, where lawyers and judges had “defended justice at great cost and often with their own lives”.
“I intend to honour that tradition,” she added in the post.
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