She is accused of having “initiated illegal and baseless actions against America and our close Israel ally”. US President Donald Trump signed a decree on Thursday, February 6, providing for sanctions against the International Criminal Court.
The text, broadcast by the White House, prohibits entry into the United States to the leaders, employees and agents of the ICC as well as to the closest members of their families and to anyone considered as having provided their aid to the work of ICC investigation. The decree also plans to freeze all the assets held in the United States by these same people. The names of the individuals targeted were not made public immediately. Previous sanctions taken by the previous Trump government in 2020 had targeted Fatou Bensouda, then the court.
According to the text released by the White House, the ICC has “initiated illegal and baseless actions against America and our close Israel”, references to the CPI investigations on alleged war crimes of American soldiers in Afghanistan and Israeli soldiers in the Gaza Strip.
The Netherlands, which house the International Criminal Court, expressed their “regrets” after the decree was announced. “The work of the Court is essential for the fight against impunity,” said Dutch Minister for Foreign Affairs Caspar Veldkamp on the social network X.
Neither the United States nor Israel is members of the ICC
The American Republicans and many Democrats had indignant from the program by the ICC of an arrest warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, received Tuesday by the American president, as well as against the former Minister of Defense Israeli Yoav Gallant. His judges estimated that there were “reasonable reasons” to suspect the two men of war crimes and crimes against humanity for the war in Gaza, who followed the unprecedented attack on Hamas on Israeli soil .
Benjamin Netanyahu had described the decision as anti -Semitic, while the former American president, Democrat Joe Biden, had described as “scandalous” the arrest mandates against the Israelis. Neither the United States nor Israel is members of the ICC, a permanent jurisdiction responsible for continuing and judging individuals accused of genocide, crime against humanity and war crime.
Founded in 2002, the Court established in The Hague now has 124 member states and has pronounced since its creation only a handful of convictions.
Donald Trump’s decision was announced shortly after that he provoked an international concussion by declaring that the United States would take possession of the Gaza Strip and ensure their economic and real estate development, while the Palestinians who reside there would be moved , under conditions which he did not specify, towards one or more neighboring countries.