Marco Rubio targets ICC’s Tomoko Akane and Abdoulaye Seye, who was investigating Israeli war crimes in Gaza
The US has sanctioned the president of the international criminal court (ICC) and a prosecutor tasked with investigating crimes committed by Israel during its war on Gaza.
The new sanctions designations were unveiled by Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, who called the Hague-based ICC a “corrupt and fatally politicized supranational court that has maliciously abused its authority and exceeded its mandate”, in a statement.
Rubio announced that the US would sanction Tomoko Akane of Japan, the ICC president, and Abdoulaye Seye of Senegal, an ICC senior trial lawyer, because they had “directly engaged in efforts by the ICC to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute officials whose government has not consented to ICC jurisdiction”.
As someone living in Japan, I’m also curious what the Japanese response will be. The current gov probably has their head so far up the US’s ass and wants to do its own shady shit, so I doubt there would be anything. Maybe silence was a part of the deal of the US helping the JPY.
The one thing I’d fix in your comment is the word “current” to “every.” At least for as long as I’ve been alive, anyway.
Fair point. In my lifetime, but before I had any interest in living in Japan, the LDP fell out of power twice. Apparently, those in control abruptly face-planted so bad it’s been back to the LDP since (though we’ll see which way the pendulum swings next election).