The United States has sanctioned four judges of the International Criminal Court (ICC) for what the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio described as “politicized targeting of America and our close ally Israel.”
Marco Rubio added that two of these judges were part of the team that initiated investigations into crimes committed by American forces in Afghanistan.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said: The International Criminal Court’s baseless and politicized targeting of America and our close ally Israel must end. Today, I have sanctioned four ICC judges for infringing on US and Israeli sovereignty – two who authorized the ICC’s baseless investigation into US personnel in Afghanistan and two who authorized the ICC’s illegitimate arrest warrants targeting Israeli prime minister Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. We call on our allies to stand with us against this disgraceful attack.”
“This move by the United States is an authoritarian action and clearly involves bullying, potentially violating all international norms,” said Janat Faheem Chakari, a political affairs analyst.
Referring to the sanctioning of the four ICC judges, the US Secretary of State also called on Washington’s allies to stand by the US.
Meanwhile, some legal experts criticized the US move, arguing that this decision would increase global distrust in the administration of justice.
“The statute known as the Rome Statute was not accepted by the US, and we have witnessed over the past two decades that the US consistently obstructed the ICC prosecutor’s attempts to travel to Afghanistan,” said Mir Abdulwahid Sadat, president of the Afghanistan National Lawyers Association.
“If these war crimes were prosecuted, it would have reduced the likelihood of the US returning to Afghanistan,” said Mohammad Asif Faqiri, a legal analyst.
The US sanctions against four ICC judges come as earlier the Russian Foreign Ministry emphasized that Western countries are trying to stop investigations into war crimes committed by their forces in Afghanistan.
