U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is seriously concerned by the U.S. decision to impose sanctions on International Criminal Court President Tomoko Akane and senior trial lawyer Abdoulaye Seye, a U.N. spokesperson said on Wednesday.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio imposed the sanctions on Tuesday in 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 Secretary-General expresses serious concern about this designation, as well as the ongoing designation of other International Criminal Court employees,” U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told a regular U.N. briefing in New York.
Dujarric said that while the United Nations and the ICC were separate institutions with distinct mandates, the U.N. viewed the court as “a key pillar of international criminal justice.”
