President Donald Trump’s administration imposed sweeping sanctions on the International Criminal Court (ICC) on Friday, October 9, 2026, as part of its campaign to dismantle the tribunal.
It comes as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio labelled the ICC a ‘rogue court’ and demanded that America’s allies ‘rein in’ the court, threatening that otherwise the US would ‘continue its campaign’ to ‘end the ICC’.
The announcement of sanctions coincided with one of the court’s former judges, Navi Pillay, taunting Donald Trump after being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
The South African jurist and former UN high commissioner for human rights joked that she might ‘share the prize’ with the US President if people kept applauding.
‘If you clap a little bit more I may share this prize with Trump,’ Ms Pillay said in a video posted to X by the Secretary General of Amnesty International, which showed Ms Pillay being applauded after the announcement of the award.
Trump has long said he deserves the prize for ending a number of global conflicts.
The US administration has been fiercely critical of the ICC over its investigation into the actions of US troops in Afghanistan and rejected its issuing an arrest warrant for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Neither the US nor Israel are signed up to the ICC – established in 2002 to prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide – and reject its jurisdiction over their citizens.
Rubio said the sanctions would ‘ban transactions’ with the ICC, ‘cutting off their resources and crippling its ability to operate’.
‘The United States and the American people are not subject to the jurisdiction of this fake ICC,’ Rubio said in a video address posted to social media.
