EU faces pressure to invoke blocking statute against US sanctions on ICC officials

NEW YORK, United States (MNTV) – US sanctions on the ICC officials have put the European Union to a big test while the EU is facing a pivotal decision that scholars say could test its commitment to international justice, and whether it will invoke its blocking statute to shield International Criminal Court (ICC) officials from sweeping US sanctions.

The US government had sanctioned four ICC officials last month, including judge Nicolas Yann Guillou, who authorized the arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant over alleged war crimes in Gaza.

Also targeted were Deputy Prosecutors Nazhat Shameem Khan and Mame Mandiaye Niang, accused of supporting illegitimate ICC actions against Israel by upholding the warrants against Israeli leaders.

The EU has the option of pushing back by invoking its blocking statute – legislation that prohibits EU companies from complying with US sanctions imposed beyond American jurisdiction.

“It is shocking that the EU has not yet included these unlawful US sanctions in its blocking statute,” Luigi Daniele, associate professor of international law at the University of Molise in Italy, told Anadolu.

Facing what he described as genocide and sanctions designed to intimidate and undermine senior international justice officials, Daniele said the EU’s hesitation is indefensible.

“It is clear that the greatest economic powers of the EU are willfully protecting the effects of these unlawful sanctions,” he said. “As such, they should respond both to their populations and to international legal institutions for this willful inaction.”

Daniele called the EU’s stance “unacceptable, not only from the legal point of view, but also from the political and moral point of view.”

In February, the Trump administration also sanctioned the ICC and Karim Khan, its chief prosecutor, accusing the court of “baseless actions targeting America and our close ally Israel.”

The blocking statute is the EU’s key tool to protect European operators from the extraterritorial reach of US sanctions, legal scholar Sergey Vasiliev explained.

“In a way, US sanctions become ‘blocked’ in the EU territory, as individuals and companies are prohibited from complying with them by refusing to provide products and services to sanctioned individuals and organizations,” Vasiliev, professor of international law at the Open University in the Netherlands, told Anadolu.

He pointed to businesses that provide IT, banking, insurance or consultancy services to the ICC or its officials as examples of entities directly exposed to US pressure.

Sanctions designations, he noted, produce a chilling effect – designated persons become “toxic” for potential partners who fear US punishment.

“The blocking statute provides legal cover to EU operators, assuring them they should not fear such extraterritorial measures within the EU,” Vasiliev said.

The regulation, directly applicable across all member states, is meant to uphold EU sovereignty and shield citizens and businesses from foreign laws that undermine the bloc’s interests.

The EU has invoked the blocking statute in the past.

“The EU has done so in the past for much less tragic and severe situations in which the sanctions had levels of illegality and criminality which are incomparable to what is being done with these sanctions today,” said Daniele. “It happened in the case of Cuba. It happened when, under President Obama, Iran negotiated the nuclear deal with the US.”

Vasiliev agreed, noting that “there is no reason not to do the same now for the ICC.”