The U.S. imposed sanctions on the International Criminal Court's (ICC) President Tomoko Akane and a senior trial lawyer at the court Abdoulaye Seye on Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said.
The move is the latest escalation in the Trump administration's campaign against The Hague-based court, which was established in 2002 by the international community to prosecute war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity. The U.S. is not a member of the court.
Rubio said in a statement that he was imposing sanctions on Akane, a Japanese judge who is president of the ICC, and Seye, a senior trial lawyer and a Senegalese national, under a Trump executive order last year authorising sanctions against the court.
Seye was on the prosecution team that sought an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and has been nominated for election as an ICC judge.
"These individuals have directly engaged in efforts by the ICC to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute officials whose government has not consented to ICC jurisdiction," Rubio said.
The U.S. imposed targeted sanctions last year on several ICC officials, including prosecutors and judges, citing the ICC's arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, as well as a past probe into U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
U.S. President Donald Trump has said the campaign was aimed at defending Netanyahu and others from prosecution, rather than himself.
Rubio argued that the court posed a threat to U.S. personnel carrying out Trump's hardline immigration policies or strikes on boats accused of carrying drugs, as well as other U.S. service members.
The sanctions freeze any U.S. assets the individuals may have and essentially cut them off from the U.S. financial system, with which almost all internationally operating banks have close ties.
The U.S. Treasury Department also issued a general license on Tuesday (18 August) authorising the wind-down of transactions involving Akane and Seye through to 17 September.
Dutch Foreign Minister Tom Berendsen said on X that the Netherlands, which hosts the court, disapproved of the latest U.S. sanctions and he had invited Akane to "discuss our continued support."
The ICC condemned the move, saying in a statement that the measures undermine the rule of law.
"When judicial actors are threatened for applying the law, it is the international legal order itself that is placed at risk," the ICC commented.
Three ICC judges sued Trump and his administration in June over sanctions, arguing the measures were unlawful.
Advocacy groups, in two separate lawsuits, have said that the U.S. campaign infringes on the constitutional rights of organisations working with the court to seek justice for atrocities around the world.
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