US sanctions ICC officials after warrants for Putin and Netanyahu

ICC member states voted out Khan in July over sexual assault allegations

The court, based in The Hague, was established in 1998 under the Rome Statute to cement the role of international law in punishing the worst human rights abuses. For most of its first two decades, the ICC concentrated on African cases and rarely confronted the world’s most powerful states.

The court issued warrants for Putin and Netanyahu, prompting sanctions from the Trump administration and exits from the Rome Statute. Human rights groups had applauded the decision to pursue leaders of major powers rather than the court’s usual targets.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has made dismantling the ICC a stated US policy goal. “The ICC has repeatedly attempted to assert authority over nationals of the United States and other countries that have not consented to its jurisdiction or ratified the Rome Statute,” Rubio said. “This sets a dangerous precedent for all nations.”

Rubio’s posture shifted from his time as a senator in 2022, when he co-sponsored a resolution encouraging the ICC to investigate war crimes in Ukraine.

This month, the US sanctioned ICC President Tomoko Akane and Abdoulaye Seye, a Senegalese lawyer who is leading the court’s investigation of Israel. The sanctions are the latest in a campaign that began after the Netanyahu warrant and has already pushed the court to switch from Microsoft Office to a German open-source operating system, after Microsoft indicated it might stop working with the ICC, court officials told The Wall Street Journal.

US pressure has produced exits from the Rome Statute. Venezuela and Chad both announced withdrawals after US sanctions were imposed. Hungary welcomed Netanyahu in 2025, refused an ICC request to arrest him, and announced its own withdrawal, though the country’s newly elected government reversed course in 2026 and said it would remain a member.

ICC member states have also refused to enforce the court’s warrants. Putin has traveled to Mongolia and Tajikistan, both ICC member nations that declined requests from the court to arrest the Russian president. ICC judges ruled against Mongolia, holding that the court’s authority under the Rome Statute overrides head-of-state immunity under treaties such as the Vienna Convention.

“The International Criminal Court is not only indisputably international in nature but also inherently independent of State influence,” a panel of ICC judges wrote in the Mongolia ruling. “The Court has progressively evolved to the effect that it acts in the interests of the international community as a whole.”

Mongolian officials said Russia had been limiting energy exports to the country before Putin’s visit, with the energy pressure essentially forcing the government to roll out the red carpet. Russia supplies almost all of both countries’ refined fuels and 13% of Mongolia’s electricity.

In July, ICC member states voted to oust Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan following an 18-month investigation into sexual assault allegations. Khan was accused of coercing one of his aides into sex on multiple occasions over many months.

In its 24-year history, the court has convicted nine people of war crimes and crimes against humanity and five of lesser offenses such as witness tampering — all from African nations. The court has apprehended 23 people under arrest warrants, while 35 others remain at large, along with an unknown number sought under warrants that remain sealed. Several high-profile cases have collapsed or been withdrawn because of weak construction or witness-protection failures.

“Its general problem is it can’t get the perpetrators in custody,” said Stephen Rapp, the former US ambassador-at-large for war crimes and chairman of the Commission for International Justice and Accountability. “The court has not been effective as a judicial institution even when it has had the perpetrators in custody.”

Former State Department legal adviser John Bellinger, who served under President George W. Bush, said the prosecution of Israeli officials was a mistake because Israel has a robust, independent judiciary capable of investigating its own officials. But Bellinger said Rubio should have proposed reforms rather than calling for the ICC’s destruction.

“The Bush administration found that there really are atrocities, human rights violations, genocide for which there are no other alternatives” to the international court, Bellinger said.

The ICC’s confrontation with major powers began with investigations the prosecutor’s office opened into alleged abuses by nonmember states on the territories of member states — US and CIA forces in Afghanistan, Russian authorities in Ukraine, and Israeli forces in Gaza. The Rome Statute allows the court to step in when national authorities are unwilling or unable to investigate.

In 2021, shortly after the US withdrew from Afghanistan, Khan decided to “deprioritize” the court’s investigation into alleged crimes by US forces and focus instead on those committed by the Taliban. “I am cognizant of the limited resources available to my office relative to the scale and nature of crimes within the jurisdiction of the court that are being or have been committed in various parts of the world,” Khan said.

The world’s most populous and powerful nations — the United States, China, India, and Russia — are not members of the ICC. Israel is also not a member. Questions about the court’s authority over nonmember states have shadowed it since the Rome Statute was signed.

Since issuing the warrants for Netanyahu and Putin, ICC judges have demanded that member states enforce them on at least three occasions, without success.