US Announces New Round of Sanctions on International Criminal Court; Rubio Threatens to Dismantle It 'Brick by Brick'

According to Deutsche Welle, the U.S. State Department announced a new round of sanctions against the International Criminal Court on Friday, just hours after the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the court's former judge, Navi Pillay. Secretary of State Marco Rubio characterized the move in a statement as an action against the 'threat posed by the International Criminal Court,' declaring in a near-ultimatum tone: 'Either the ICC stops its threats, or we will end the ICC.'

Rubio claimed that Trump 'will never allow an international court to prosecute Americans,' announced a ban on transactions with this 'rogue court,' and pledged to 'cut off its resources and paralyze its operational capacity.' He also directed pressure at U.S. allies — many of which are ICC state parties and rely on U.S. military protection — demanding that they 'restrain' the court, otherwise 'the United States will continue to dismantle the International Criminal Court brick by brick, until Americans are no longer threatened.'

The new sanctions are the latest escalation in a series of pressure campaigns carried out by the United States in recent months. In August of this year, the United States already sanctioned the president of the ICC, Japanese judge Tomoko Akane, as well as the court's Senegalese lawyer Abdoulaye Saye. In a response on Friday, Akane herself said the court 'will continue to fully fulfill its mission, maintaining independence and impartiality, acting solely on the basis of law and evidence, for the sake of countless victims of serious crimes.' The court characterized the Rome Statute as a 'collective commitment' — the most serious international crimes must not go unpunished — and warned that 'one should not be punished for serving the cause of justice,' calling on state parties to take 'concrete action' to ensure the necessary means for the court to continue its work.

According to Deutsche Welle, the Norwegian Nobel Committee, while not naming the United States in its citation, clearly echoed this moment. The committee wrote: 'The Norwegian Nobel Committee wishes to remind the world that domestic and international rule of law is the cornerstone of the system we have built to ensure peace and the nonviolent resolution of conflicts.' The committee noted that judges like Pillay 'guard the thin red line between order and chaos,' but that 'today… these judges themselves are being sanctioned and the institution to which they belong is under attack.'

U.S. pressure has already spread to the Global South. According to Deutsche Welle, in July of this year, the military government of Chad announced its withdrawal from the ICC at the request of the United States; the new government of Venezuela, following the U.S. 'kidnapping' of Nicolas Maduro in January, also announced its withdrawal from the Rome Statute. Previously, Rubio wrote an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal in July, warning that American 'soldiers, police, border patrol officers and elected leaders' could be 'dragged into an international court,' to be tried by judges from countries 'from all over the world.'

In recent years, the ICC has issued arrest warrants for Russian President Putin and others over the Russia-Ukraine conflict, and for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and others over Israel's actions in Gaza — both the United States and Israel strongly oppose these moves. Immediately after the U.S. announced the sanctions, Netanyahu thanked the U.S. for its 'leadership,' characterizing the ICC as 'not a court,' but rather 'a political institution that poses a lethal threat to the rule of law, to democracies around the world, and even to the concept of national sovereignty.'

According to Deutsche Welle, Canada, Denmark, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom have issued a joint statement expressing 'strong opposition' to the U.S. sanctions and warning that the sanctions will 'have a significant impact on the work of the court, its staff and their families.' These eight countries are all state parties to the Rome Statute; currently a total of 125 countries around the world are state parties to the statute, but the United States, China, India, Israel and Russia all refuse to recognize the jurisdiction of the ICC.