- https://archive.is/DFHM6
- "Without commenting on ongoing cases, he called on European authorities to activate a mechanism that could limit the impact of US restrictions."
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ICC member states should take steps to ensure the sanctioned judges and prosecutors do not suffer as a result of U.S. sanctions. The goal should be to ensure that they feel no repercussions that might bias them one way or the other in future cases and thus maintain impartiality. If this is not done, it could create an apparent feedback loop, if only in the public's imagination. i.e. After some future ICC ruling goes against them (or Israel/Russia), the U.S. may claim that ICC judges and prosecutors are prejudiced against them and are seeking revenge. Protecting ICC personnel now could blunt such claims. Sadly, I fear that the U.S. may have need of defence from ICC rulings relatively soon.
- The whole banned via banking thing is scary. A local business in my area was flagged as some sort of illicit operation. There was almost no way to know it even happened outside being unable to take payment ... that was it.
No notice, no reason why, no recourse for them. They had google for their life for weeks talking to people online who it happened to and make dozens upon dozens of phone calls and explain the whole saga every time. Tons of false leads and promises for folks to call them back who never did.
They eventually found that it was some old bank they were in good standing with who after weeks of not responding, still couldn't explain why, but they said they apparently flagged them. It was undone after about 12 weeks and ultimately only because someone at this random bank took the initiative to lift the flag, but they didn't have to.
The process is completely opaque and you effectively have no rights to know or resolve anything.
- "What is the purpose of the American sanctions mechanism?
Initially, it was created to address human rights violations[...]"
Yet here we are: it's being used to harass judges who address human rights violations.
- > "On top of that, all payment systems are American: American Express, Visa, Mastercard. Overnight, you find yourself without a bank card, and these companies have an almost complete monopoly, at least in Europe."
On one hand, this shows how important it is for paper cash to have first-class citizen status when it comes to legal tender.
On the other hand, how does the largest single currency zone in the world not have its own debit card settlement system? The Germany-only Girocard appears to have been mostly phased out, and doesn't work outside Germany unless it's co-branded with MC/Visa. Same with France's Card Bancaire. Besides that, 39% of online purchases in Germany are made through PayPal or MC/Visa.
[0] https://stripe.com/en-ca/resources/more/payment-methods-germ...
by pcthrowaway
2 subcomments
- The U.S. has also sanctioned Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories
- There’s a fundamental flaw in the concept of “international justice”.
On a nation level the power of a court to prosecute individuals is supported by a policing force that is capable of resorting to violence on a local level that is acceptable for the greater peace.
On an international level, enforcing justice would ultimately require going to war, with mass casualties and likely numerous incidents of potential breaches of the law itself.
In the example of Israel vs Hamas, the ICC warrant included the leaders of Hamas - but the ICC had zero chance of actually arresting them, they were killed by Israel though. So half of the defendants carried out the justice sought by the ICC on the other half.
- So many commenters here assume US global hegemony that, in reality, expired after the 1980s. Without its allies in Europe and Asia, the US can't act effectively.
- Fantastic news. The more of this, the sooner Europe wakes up and starts accelerating sovereignty. Please keep it coming!
- The ICC was never meant to be used against the West.
- The more wild US gets with its sanction powers the more it draws other countries to move usa away from the center of the financial system.
Nobody cares when usa was sanctioning random Iranians or Russians comitting human rights abuses, but the ICC is relatively popular in europe and the optics of this makes america look like gangsters. Obviously nothing is going to happen in the short term, but i wonder how it will errode american soft power in the long term if they keep this sort of thing up.
- On surely unrelated news: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46403276
- The US did this to a slate of Hong Kong administrators in 2020 for implementing China's repressive national security law. It didn't seem to act as a deterrent, as the US did it again to a different group of officials earlier this year.
https://hongkongfp.com/2025/04/01/us-sanctions-6-officials-i...
One of the sanctioned officials reportedly keeps "piles of cash" at her house.
https://news.bitcoin.com/unbanked-hong-kong-leader-carrie-la...
- There should be no way the government can 'debank' someone in the first place. Monetary relations with other people have always been untouched by the state until very recently, even for revolutionaries. A private transaction is not anyone's business apart from the counterparties.
Assuming that someone should not be allowed to freely earn, spend, invest and participate in the economy without a proved felony is a dystopian concept.
Either have a proper fair public trial and put criminals in prison for serious violations or don't discriminate against anyone's stuff at all if you don't have any proofs. Otherwise it's massively used to give advantages to citizens of several nations to do business and earn while discriminating against others because of 'high risks' without any public court hearing, based on nationality, citizenship or organizational relations.
by ycombinary
0 subcomment
- The US is not a serious country anymore.
by ekjhgkejhgk
0 subcomment
- The Israelis control the US government.
- The US is now literally sanctioning UN experts and ICC people if they push too hard on accountability for alleged Israeli war crimes, e.g. Francesca Albanese over her Gaza reports and support for ICC cases. In Germany (and elsewhere) it often doesn’t need formal sanctions: people get disinvited, smeared, or quietly pushed out of jobs if they’re too vocal on Palestine – think Ai Weiwei, Greta Thunberg, Masha Gessen, Ilan Pappé, Ghassan Hage and others running into cancellations, funding cuts, and public delegitimisation instead of explicit legal punishment.
by fleahunter
0 subcomment
- Using a human-rights sanctions framework against judges of a court literally created to prosecute human-rights violations is the snake eating its own tail. Sanctions used to be targeted at people trying to blow up the rule of law, now they are being used at people trying to apply it in ways that are politically inconvenient to a superpower and its allies.
This is why so many non-Western states call "rules-based order" a branding exercise: the same legal tool that hits warlords and cartel bosses is repurposed, with no structural checks, against judges whose decisions you dislike. And once you normalize that, you've handed every other great power a precedent: "our courts, our sanctions list, our enemies." The short-term message is "don't touch our friends"; the long-term message is "international law is just foreign policy with better stationery."
by emilfihlman
0 subcomment
- I think the important thing here is that governments shouldn't have the right to make life hard for ordinary people with punishments like taking away access to banks and finance system etc.
As for the US slapping European politicians etc, it's high time the people on high horses in Europe feel the shit they push on ordinary people.
by ChrisArchitect
0 subcomment
- Related:
'It's surreal': How US sanctions lock ICC judges out of daily life
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46293048
by ChrisArchitect
0 subcomment
- News from 2 months ago;
Discussion then: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45706056
- I am intrigued by the fact the US acts despite no US citizen having an arrest warrant put out for them.
Israel can't do sanctions for Israelis?
I mean, the realpolitik of these sanctions by the US is in hope that the USs involvement in Gaza doesn't get arrest warrants for their own officials / Presidents. Or for war crimes and human rights violations against Venezuelan boats.
Does make Israel look either weak or like a small person puppeteering a much bigger person though.
Additionally, tangentially, I find it interesting the reluctance the US has had, for three entirety of Trump's term so far, in extending sanctions on Russia for it's continued bombardment of Ukraine.
Speaks volumes about the (confusing, although maybe just rapid direction/ally change) motivations of the current administration.
by MPSFounder
0 subcomment
- Regardless of your views on this, it is highly concerning that America the giant bends over for a foreign nation built on human rights violations, that does not respect life or property (i.e, West Bank). Rich Jews dictate foreign policy driven largely by religiosity that is reminiscent of the Jones cult, while Americans just accept the fact we do their bidding. Nothing short of insulting. I visited Israel and was very much surprised at the Polish and Russian inhabitants that feel some delusional connection to a land and could use it to murder children and steal more land (just look at Lebanon and Syria right now, where Israelis are inching every day). It is beyond delusion, but religion does wonders. Some cultists in Utah justify marrying teenagers, the Israelis are similar in that regard. They can justify mutilating children because a Russian feels he is owed that land. However, Europe has long stood with Israel, so let them reap what they sow. Gentiles will learn one way or another that Israelis care not for the West, for they only serve their evil interests. The lesson of the Holocaust for our Jewish friends was kill an enemy (and here, the definition is broad, for a 1 year old that is still nursing in his mother's mutilated arm is an enemy because they were so born) before they even think of inflicting damage, and leave no child behind. And again, for our Jewish friends, never again has a fine print. Never again not for Christians, nor muslims, nor atheists. Only for the tribe. Remarkably, there is so much damage this is causing for the tribe. Every white man 18-30 views not Nazis, not atheists, nor Muslims are an enemy, but Israel. The schism in the right wing reflects this. Hopefully, America will one day demand reparations from Israel, for America has no masters. Our ideals are far greater than those of vile people that could hurt a child while smirking in Mar-a-lago near a puppet president that sits at their command.
- The problem is many people — not here on HN but in general — were happy or at least unperturbed when this happened to right wing figures like Donald Trump, the trucker protestors in Canada and the 1/6 capitol riot people in the US.
It was incredibly obvious this would be inflicted in the other direction to anyone who followed what happened to Wikileaks supporters or people around Ed Snowden.
To everyone saying this is about US hegemony, note not only Canada but also UK (see Nigel Farage) has inflicted this on their own citizens - so they certainly helped lay the groundwork for what amount to extremely petty sanctions (and they too have participated in sanctions efforts).
by josefritzishere
0 subcomment
- This tactic broadcasts Trump's guilt, and the guilt of others by association. It's hard to imagine how this will play out. It's very worrisome that the USA is collapsing into a fascist state. I feel bad for young people who inherit the consequences of these terrible decisions.
by fleroviumna
0 subcomment
- [dead]
- [flagged]
- [flagged]
- Time to protect EU citizens from US human rights abuses. Require EU banks to ignore foreign sanctions and call the US bluff.
- Summary: far left liberal judge who sanctions others for their political opinions is in return sanctioned.
- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46432107
I wonder if (when?) elites are going to use and support Bitcoin. Oppressive governments will force citizens - even such powerful as judges - to search for escapes.
by ExoticPearTree
4 subcomments
- Unpopular opinion, but the US and a handful of other countries do not recognize the ICC and in their eyes it does not exist; hence the US has no obligation to support them in any way.
The ICC was warned before picking on Israel, but it did not listen. Now they’re paying the consequences.
by throwaway198846
1 subcomments
- Nitpick:
> Both men are indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity for their roles in the destruction of the Gaza Strip.
Role in destruction isn't a war crime they are being indicted for and as such irrelevant in this context.
by Lysander1
3 subcomments
- What's good for the goose is good for the gander. The US is acting to impose sanctions on individuals with no direct ties to it by using its legal authority over American entities. The reason the US wants to do this is because the ICC is seeking to impose its legal authority over individuals whose state has not joined the ICC with novel legal theories and using its legal authority over ICC states. If the ICC had remained in areas where its legal authority is clear and not disputed, its judges and prosecutors wouldn't be facing this issue.
- FWIW it's kind of refreshing to see a judicial official on the receiving end of this treatment. I know he's not one of the judges who permitted the debanking of protesters in Canada, but 1:1 of like-kind is probably all we can ask for.
Those who so flippantly censor and ostracise dissidents deserve a periodic taste of their own concoctions.
- Good so. Many European activists have been sanctioned and debanked by the EU without the judicial process.
It's good to see an European politician (ICC judge is a political role) to test own medicine.
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