๐จ๐The ICC is fine when it investigates Russia. Not when it looks at America.
On June 29, 2026, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche sent a formal letter to ICC President Judge Tomoko Akane. The message was direct and unambiguous. The United States rejects any assertion of jurisdiction by the International Criminal Court over American citizens, anywhere in the world. The DOJ will not cooperate with any ICC investigation, inquiry, summons, or proceeding involving Americans. And it will actively oppose any effort by other countries to extradite or transfer Americans to the court.
The letter cites the American Servicemembers Protection Act of 2002, which rejects ICC jurisdiction over US military personnel, government officials, and civilians. It authorizes the president to use all means necessary to secure the release of any American detained under an ICC warrant. Blanche called the ICC increasingly lawless and illegitimate, citing selective enforcement and credible allegations of internal misconduct.
Here is what the letter did not mention.
The United States supported the UN Security Council's referral of Sudan's Darfur atrocities to the ICC in 2005. It backed the Security Council's referral of Libya in 2011. It has consistently supported ICC investigations into Russian conduct in Ukraine, publicly endorsing the court's arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin issued in 2023. The ICC is a legitimate and valuable institution of international justice when its jurisdiction points toward America's adversaries. It becomes lawless and illegitimate the moment its jurisdiction points toward Washington or its allies.
An NYU professor of international criminal law told Newsweek plainly that the Rome Statute provides that if American nationals were to commit genocide, war crimes, or crimes against humanity on the territory of an ICC member state, the court does have jurisdiction regardless of whether the US has joined. That legal argument is not settled. It is contested. And the US position that a treaty cannot bind a non-consenting country is a legitimate legal argument. But it cuts both ways. Russia has made the exact same argument to reject the ICC's jurisdiction over its conduct in Ukraine. China has made the same argument. The US cannot simultaneously cite that principle to protect its own personnel and reject it when applied by Moscow or Beijing.
The timing of this letter matters, and no mainstream outlet is connecting it directly. US forces conducted active military strikes on Iranian territory under Operation Epic Fury from February 28 through mid-June 2026. Those operations involved strikes that killed Iranian military personnel and civilians. Lebanon, an ICC member state, was directly affected by the broader regional conflict. Jordan, another ICC member state, hosted US military bases that were struck and from which retaliatory operations were conducted. Sending a formal letter explicitly rejecting ICC jurisdiction and threatening to oppose other countries' extradition efforts, in the immediate aftermath of those operations, is not a coincidence. It is legal protection.
The US has spent decades positioning itself as the world's enforcer of international norms. It has justified military interventions from Iraq to Libya to Iran on the basis of protecting civilian populations, upholding international law, and holding aggressors accountable. Those are not empty claims. American military power has genuinely shaped the international order for generations.
But accountability cannot be selectively applied. A nation that invokes international law to justify its military actions cannot simultaneously declare itself exempt from the institutions designed to enforce that same law. That is not sovereignty. It is impunity with better branding.
The ICC may be imperfect. Every institution is. But the principle that no nation should be above accountability for war crimes does not have an exception clause for the most powerful military on earth.
Dalam pengalaman saya mengikuti dinamika hukum internasional dan politik global, sikap Amerika Serikat terhadap International Criminal Court (ICC) menunjukkan bagaimana kekuatan besar berusaha mengendalikan sistem hukum internasional sesuai kepentingan nasionalnya. Surat resmi dari Departemen Kehakiman AS yang menolak kerja sama dengan ICC menegaskan penolakan absolut terhadap yurisdiksi pengadilan ini terhadap warga negara Amerika, bahkan saat operasi militer AS melibatkan wilayah negara anggota ICC seperti Lebanon dan Yordania. Saya pernah membaca sejumlah kajian hukum yang menyoroti bahwa meskipun AS bukan anggota ICC, ada argumen kuat bahwa ICC tetap memiliki yurisdiksi jika kejahatan dilakukan di wilayah negara anggota ICC. Namun, penolakan Amerika terhadap hal ini membuka diskusi besar tentang keberpihakan hukum internasional serta ambivalensi penerapan prinsip keadilan global. Keputusan AS menolak yurisdiksi ICC pasca operasi militer seperti Operation Epic Fury juga saya lihat sebagai upaya strategis untuk melindungi personel militer dan pejabatnya dari proses hukum internasional yang dianggap dapat menghambat kebijakan luar negeri AS. Namun, sikap ini mengundang kritik karena menunjukkan ketidakonsistenan dalam menerapkan standar hukum yang sama terhadap semua negara, apalagi ketika AS aktif mendukung investigasi ICC terhadap Rusia, Sudan, dan Libya. Dalam keseharian saya, diskursus semacam ini sangat penting untuk dibagikan agar masyarakat memahami kompleksitas hukum internasional dan bagaimana kekuatan politik dapat memengaruhi penegakan hukum tersebut. ICC memang bukan lembaga sempurna, tetapi prinsip dasar bahwa tidak ada negara yang boleh bebas dari akuntabilitas terhadap kejahatan perang harus menjadi pegangan bersama. Sikap selektif seperti yang ditunjukkan AS cenderung melemahkan misi ICC dan nilai-nilai keadilan internasional. Saya menyarankan pembaca agar terus mengikuti perkembangan situasi ini melalui sumber-sumber berita tepercaya dan diskusi akademik, serta memahami bahwa keadilan internasional adalah perjuangan kolektif yang memerlukan komitmen dari semua negara tanpa kecuali. Pengalaman saya menunjukkan bahwa hanya dengan transparansi dan kesetaraan perlakuan di mata hukum internasional, perdamaian dan keadilan global dapat lebih terwujud.
