The Trump administration imposes sanctions on the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), an intergovernmental organization that prosecutes criminals for international crimes that their own government won’t prosecute.
The ICC is currently investigating U.S. war crimes in Afghanistan.
Richard Dicker, the international justice director at Human Rights Watch, said the announcement “marks a stunning perversion of US sanctions, devised to penalize rights abusers and kleptocrats, to persecute those tasked with prosecuting international crimes”.
“The Trump administration has twisted these sanctions to obstruct justice, not only for certain war crimes victims, but for atrocity victims anywhere looking to the international criminal court for justice,” Dicker said.
MSN
The only reason Secretary of State Mike Pomeo gives for the new sanctions is that the ICC is targeting Americans for war crimes… which is its job. Pompeo issued lighter sanctions as a threat in June.
Trump just announced personal sanctions against…officials at the International Criminal Court. Personal sanctions. These people aren’t Osama Bin Laden. They prosecute the world’s war criminals.
Now, if you’re American, pay attention. Nobody teaches you about this stuff, but they should, and that’s how Trump wins.
The ICC is one of the world’s greatest accomplishments. It’s tried everyone from African warlords to Eastern European neo-fascists. It took humanity until 1990 to set it up. That is how long the idea that there are “crimes against humanity” really took to build an institutional fabric for.
Now let’s say that you were about to, oh, send shock troops into the streets, where they’d beat and gas moms and dads, who were protesting, because you just stole an election. Let’s say, further, that you were going to incite “militias” to do violence to advocates of democracy — like in Kenosha.
Who would you want not to hold you accountable? That’s right — the ICC. The whole body of institutions the ICC represents, in fact. The UN, it’s observers, the peaceful and sane world. You would want none of those to have any power over you.
Because you would want to be able to commit mass human rights abuses with impunity.
Umair Haque
No other Western democracy or U.S. ally supports the Trump administration’s anti-ICC campaign except for Israel.
Under these new sanctions on Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda and her aide Phakiso Mochochoko, any assets they possess in the United States are frozen, they are not allowed to do business in the United States, and anyone aiding them in an investigation of the United States will face similar sanctions.
The ICC is the first and only permanent international court with jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression. It is intended to complement existing national judicial systems and it may therefore exercise its jurisdiction only when national courts are unwilling or unable to prosecute criminals. The ICC lacks universal territorial jurisdiction, and may only investigate and prosecute crimes committed within member states, crimes committed by nationals of member states, or crimes in situations referred to the Court by the United Nations Security Council.
Sources
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2020/09/02/United-States-sanctions-two-top-International-Criminal-Court-officials/2351599084815/
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/us-imposes-sanctions-on-top-international-criminal-court-officials/ar-BB18DA1y
https://thehill.com/policy/defense/514823-trump-administration-imposes-sanctions-on-icc-prosecutor-investigating-alleged
https://web.archive.org/web/20200903182932/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Criminal_Court
https://eand.co/american-democracy-will-die-in-60-days-54ce25626c1c
Photo: Public Domain