How would increased U.S. sanctions against ICC affect the court

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NPR's Steve Inskeep speaks with Kimberly Prost, who sits on the International Criminal Court, the impact of U.S. sanctions on ICC judges.

STEVE INSKEEP, BYLINE: The Trump administration is deciding whether to follow through on a threat. The administration publicly threatened a whole of government campaign to, quote, "systematically dismantle" the International Criminal Court for investigating Americans or Israelis. Over the summer, the U.S. threatened increased sanctions against the court. We have an idea of what this would look like because the U.S. already sanctioned some individuals working for the court, including Judge Kimberly Prost. She's Canadian. Six years ago, she authorized an investigation of the war in Afghanistan.

KIMBERLY PROST: Which covered all of the alleged crimes committed in Afghanistan, ISIS, Taliban and included a small component related to the United States.

INSKEEP: Prosecutors never did investigate Americans, but they could have. The ICC is a world court based at The Hague in the Netherlands. It prosecutes war crimes and other crimes against humanity. The United States helped to create it but never joined it, and the Trump administration asserts that it violates U.S. sovereignty and also targets Israel. Last year, the U.S. cut off Judge Prost from the global financial system.

How quickly did your life begin to change?

PROST: Almost immediately. So one of the most significant impacts is you immediately lose all your credit cards. Doesn't matter where they were issued. Mine were issued in the Netherlands and Canada. They're immediately canceled. And then you start to lose services for American companies. Completely randomly, though. You don't know when something's going to happen, but with me, it was Amazon, for example. I went , and Alexa wouldn't talk to me.

INSKEEP: Ha. You mean you had one of those smart speakers, and it suddenly got dumb?

PROST: Exactly. That's the length to which these sanctions can reach.

INSKEEP: You still have a bank that can receive your paycheck from the ICC?

PROST: Yes, I do have some banking services that banks have agreed to provide me here in the Netherlands and in my country in Canada. But I emphasize that these sanctions are American sanctions. They are not binding in any way on companies outside of American companies, and yet we have this massive overcompliance by companies because exactly what you've mentioned, they have business interests with the United States, so they comply. One of the most egregious issues that's arisen for us is the company that provides medical insurance for the court - of which I'm a part - is refusing. It's a French company, AXA, and they're refusing to pay my medical insurance claims.

INSKEEP: Does that mean...

PROST: And they're not under - by law required to do that. It's a business decision.

INSKEEP: Does that mean you are uninsured?

PROST: Effectively, at the moment, yes.

INSKEEP: Do you think if you quit your job as a judge, you would get better treatment?

PROST: Well, let me assure you one thing - I will never quit my job as a judge. And these methods that they're using - these coercive measures - are completely futile because I can assure you that I, along with all my colleagues here at the court - the prosecutors and the judges who've been sanctioned - we continue to carry out our jobs objectively, independently and in accordance with the oath that we've taken, and that will never change. And the ICC will continue to try and end impunity for these horrible crimes and bring justice to victims.

INSKEEP: What do you make of the American arguments against the ICC, which are rooted in American sovereignty, the idea that Americans should judge Americans and that some people in this country don't want to hand even a fragment of that authority over to some foreign court?

PROST: Yes. I think what's really important for people to realize is this court is no threat at all to any national jurisdiction. This court operates entirely complementarily. So when there are allegations of horrific crimes, we expect, we hope, we want states to investigate them, including non-states parties like the United States. We only intervene when no one is taking any action and there's horrific allegations of crimes.

INSKEEP: It sounds like your assertion is the ICC should have the power to investigate and charge an American military officer, say, if they have committed a war crime and you judge that no country is investigating properly.

PROST: If it's committed on the territory - this is very important - of a state party. We have no jurisdiction with respect to the United States writ large. But if these crimes are alleged to taken place on a state party - which Afghanistan is to the Rome Statute - then just as the law of Afghanistan applies, they've accepted that the court's law and the court's power to investigate applies, so that is the only context in which we are able to investigate.

INSKEEP: Kimberly Prost is a judge at the International Criminal Court who's been sanctioned by the United States. Thanks so much.

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