Key Points
ใปOn August 18, 2026, the United States designated Tomoko Akane, the Japanese judge who serves as president of the International Criminal Court, and Japan’s government responded that the measures were very unfortunate, drawing criticism that the answer was too weak. Six days earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to Etorofu had already provoked criticism of the government’s Russia policy, leaving the Takaichi government accused of weakness twice in one week.
ใปThe words differed sharply. Washington received a press secretary’s statement calling the measures very unfortunate, while Russia was told the visit was absolutely unacceptable and its ambassador was summoned. The concrete countermeasures, sanctions or a demand for withdrawal, were absent in both cases.
ใปThe American argument about jurisdiction and the method of imposing financial sanctions on individual judges can be separated. Options for taking a position on the method without a head on collision with the ally remain open, and whether Japan uses them is the question now in front of it.
โผ Watch this article as a video
US Sanctions ICC President Akane, Japan Says Very Unfortunate
The US State Department announced on August 18, 2026, in a press statement issued under the name of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, that it had designated Tomoko Akane, president of the International Criminal Court, and Senior Trial Lawyer Abdoulaye Seye. The legal basis is Executive Order 14203 of February 2025, which freezes assets in the United States and bars transactions with US persons and the US financial system.
The statement called the ICC a corrupt and fatally politicized supranational court, and gave as the reason for the designations direct engagement in efforts to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute officials of governments that have not consented to the court’s jurisdiction. It did not name any specific decision by Akane.
The same statement placed the sanctions within a diplomatic campaign against the court’s threat that Washington began in July, and said it expected other countries to end their funding of and participation in the ICC. The court responded on August 19 that the measures were a flagrant attack on judicial independence. According to the ICC’s statement of that day, the designation brought the number of its 18 judges under US sanctions to nine.
According to the Japanese Foreign Ministry’s press secretary statement of August 19, 2026, Japan has consistently supported the ICC, and from that position the announced measures are very unfortunate. The same statement said Japan would work to strengthen the rule of law while maintaining communication with related countries. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi told reporters the same day that she found the measures very unfortunate and that Japan would respond while continuing communication with related countries including the United States.
That response drew a run of criticism at home for weakness. On the same day, a cross party group of lawmakers led by former Defense Minister Gen Nakatani issued an emergency statement condemning the sanctions in the strongest terms as a grave violation of the rule of law, and called on the government to protest clearly.
Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi, asked at a press conference in Oman on August 20 whether Japan would seek withdrawal of the sanctions, did not answer directly, saying that Japan had made various approaches to the United States in the past.
Six days before the designation, on August 13, Putin visited Etorofu, one of the four disputed islands off Hokkaido, the first such visit by a sitting Russian president. Japan’s response came in a statement in Motegi’s own name calling the visit extremely regrettable and absolutely unacceptable, and Russian Ambassador Nikolai Nozdrev was summoned to the Foreign Ministry to protest.
That response drew criticism of its own. On August 18, Yuichiro Tamaki, leader of the Democratic Party for the People, called the government’s posture toward Russia excessively weak, as FNN reported.
The LDP discussed the ICC sanctions and the Etorofu visit at the same foreign affairs division meeting on August 21. According to Kei Takagi, who chairs the division, members said Japan ought to be in the business of protecting Akane, as Reuters reported.
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The ICC, Japan’s Stake in It, and Where the Weakness Charge Comes From
The court that tries individuals, and its first Japanese president
The ICC is a permanent international court that tries individuals, not states, for the gravest crimes such as war crimes and genocide. It was created by the Rome Statute adopted in 1998, began work in 2002, and sits in The Hague. According to the ICC’s list of states parties, it had 125 states parties as of August 2026. The United States, Russia, China, and Israel are not among them.
It is a different institution from the International Court of Justice, which shares the same city. The ICJ is a United Nations organ that handles disputes between states. The ICC prosecutes people. Because it has no police force of its own, the ICC depends on states parties for arrests and for money. At present a Japanese national heads each court: Yuji Iwasawa at the ICJ and Akane at the ICC.
Akane is a former prosecutor who served as chief prosecutor of the Hakodate District Public Prosecutors Office and head of the Research and Training Institute of the Ministry of Justice before becoming an ICC judge in 2018. In March 2024 she became the first Japanese national elected president of the court. Her term runs to March 2027.
Russia placed Akane on a wanted list over the 2023 arrest warrant for Putin, and a Moscow court convicted her in absentia in December 2025. The US sanctions rest on different grounds, which leaves her targeted by Washington and Moscow at once.
The president represents the court, but individual arrest warrants are decided by panels of the judges assigned to each case. The US has not explained which of Akane’s decisions the designation relates to.
Japan is the ICC’s largest funder
Japan acceded to the Rome Statute in 2007, late among states parties. It nevertheless pays the largest assessed contribution of any state party: according to nippon.com’s compilation of the ICC’s 2023 budget, Japan’s share was 15.9 percent, ahead of Germany at 11.4 percent and France at 8.5 percent. Part of the reason is structural: because the United States, China, and Russia are not members, Japan’s high United Nations assessment puts it automatically at the top of the ICC’s list.
Japan has also supplied people without interruption, from Judge Fumiko Saiga in 2007 to Kuniko Ozaki and then Akane, and nominated a candidate for the next judicial election in November 2025. For a foreign policy that places the rule of law at the center of its Free and Open Indo Pacific concept, the ICC is one of the institutions that gives the slogan an address.
Japan has not defended the court unconditionally. When Prosecutor Karim Khan was removed by a vote of the Assembly of States Parties in July 2026 over serious misconduct, Japan took part in the process as one of the 21 countries on the Bureau, and its press secretary statement welcomed the removal. Support and internal accountability have run together.
Washington has alternated between welcome and sanctions
The United States signed the Rome Statute in 2000, effectively withdrew that signature in 2002, and in the same year enacted the American Service-Members’ Protection Act, authorizing all means necessary and appropriate to free Americans held by the court. Yet when the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Putin in 2023, President Joe Biden called it justified. The turn came after the court issued warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in November 2024.
| Date | US action | Context |
|---|---|---|
| 2002 | Signature to the Rome Statute withdrawn, ASPA enacted | Fear of prosecution of US soldiers |
| September 2020 | Trump administration sanctions Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda and a senior official | Investigation of US forces and the CIA in Afghanistan |
| April 2021 | Biden administration lifts the sanctions | Described as inappropriate and ineffective |
| March 2023 | Biden calls the arrest warrant for Putin justified | Invasion of Ukraine |
| February 2025 | Executive Order 14203 signed, Prosecutor Karim Khan designated | Arrest warrant for Netanyahu |
| June to December 2025 | Eight judges and two deputy prosecutors designated in stages | Involvement in warrants and the Afghanistan investigation |
| August 2026 | President Akane and a senior trial lawyer designated | Part of a campaign to dismantle the court |
Compiled from US State Department statements, the Japanese Foreign Ministry’s press secretary statement of April 3, 2021, and news reporting.
The core of the US argument is sovereignty and consent: neither the United States nor Israel is a party to the Rome Statute, so the court has no authority over their nationals. The ICC’s position is that the statute covers crimes committed on the territory of states parties, so conduct in Afghanistan, a party since 2003, or in Palestine, a party since 2015, falls within its reach regardless of the perpetrator’s nationality. It has repeatedly rejected Israel’s challenges on that basis.
Whether jurisdiction extends to nationals of non parties is genuinely contested among international lawyers. The separate question of freezing the personal assets of judges and prosecutors to stop them working has drawn criticism from European governments and the court as pressure on judicial independence, whatever one concludes about jurisdiction.
How far the criticism spread
Criticism at home came from the government’s own side as well as the opposition. The Constitutional Democratic Party issued a statement calling very unfortunate entirely insufficient, and demanded that the government criticize the sanctions clearly and call for their withdrawal.
A former cabinet minister from the governing Liberal Democratic Party said the government should speak more sternly to the United States, as the Tokyo Shimbun reported, and the Nikkei reported that Japan was facing charges of weakness. Posts questioning the government’s language by citing an editorial in the conservative Yomiuri Shimbun spread widely, and on this issue the usual left right axis barely formed.
The criticism grew with time. The complaint immediately after the announcement was general, that Japan should have protested. Once reporting spelled out the practical damage, that credit cards, bank accounts, and American internet services would stop working, it spread again.
Akane herself commented on August 21 through the publisher of her book, saying the sanctions were something she had expected to a degree and had not surprised her, that what mattered was preventing this from becoming the beginning of the end of the international rule of law, and that support from Japan and from the Japanese people would be an important key.
Abroad, the language ran stronger than Japan’s. United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres was reported to have expressed serious concern.
| Country or body | Who spoke | Word used | Concrete move |
|---|---|---|---|
| France | Foreign ministry | Condemns | Expressed solidarity with the designated judges |
| Belgium | Foreign minister | Condemns | Said it would pursue activation of EU countermeasures |
| EU | High Representative and Commission President | Deeply regrets | Pledged full support to shield the court and its staff from pressure |
| Netherlands | Foreign minister | Disapproves | Said it would invite President Akane to discuss support |
| Germany | Foreign ministry spokesperson | Supports the court | Said public and non public measures were under way |
| Japan | Press secretary, plus remarks by the prime minister and foreign minister | Very unfortunate | Communication with related countries, various approaches |
| UK and Canada | No government statement identified as of August 23 |
Statements were made on August 19 and 20, 2026. Sources are the foreign ministries concerned and news reporting. Europe is not uniform either. Germany’s supportive framing sits close to Japan’s temperature.
What the conciliation charge is about
The word weak was not aimed only at the ICC file. Over the Etorofu visit six days earlier, criticism ran the other way, holding that the government’s posture toward Russia was itself the cause.
What Tamaki cited as grounds for excessively weak was a planned economic mission and the resumption of short term study trips to Russia for university students. The Takaichi government did announce in February 2026 that it would press harder for a resumption of visits to family graves on the islands, sent a Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry bureau chief to Russia in May, saw Motegi exchange words with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in July for the first time in about five years, and resumed in August a student exchange suspended since 2019. The government says its Russia policy is unchanged. Critics call the sequence conciliation and see it as having invited the visit.
Criticism of the Russia file also runs in the opposite direction, that the response was slow and thin and should have come earlier and harder. The government has its own reason for keeping the window open: with the former island residents averaging 89.3 years of age, a resumption of graveside visits is a race against time, and closing off dialogue closes that route too.
The causal claim, that conciliation invited the visit, is not established. Takako Suzuki, head of the LDP’s public relations bureau, called the reading that the visit happened because Takaichi is prime minister far too simplistic, and the visit is also read as a domestic performance ahead of Russia’s September parliamentary elections. Putin himself said the day before the visit that Japan had changed its position, criticizing Japan for having hardened, which points the opposite way from the idea that he exploited an opening.
Of the two charges of weakness, the ICC file is the one examined from here. The entry point is the same as the one the criticism at home started from: whether Japan can raise its voice.
How to Read Very Unfortunate
There are reasons behind the criticism and reasons behind the defense. Setting both out narrows the disagreement to the one point where the assessments divide.
Proximity, and the distance from the stated principle
What separates this designation from the earlier ones is that the target is the Japanese president of the court herself. Japan pays the largest assessed contribution and sent Akane to The Hague with the confidence of the other states parties.
Even so, the government’s wording stayed at the level it used when other countries’ judges were designated in 2025, the statement came no higher than the press secretary, and there was no demand for withdrawal. According to the joint statement of February 7, 2025 published by the Dutch government, 79 states parties expressed unwavering support for the court when the Trump administration issued its first executive order, and Japan was not among them. Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and Canada signed. Human Rights Watch, in an April 2025 joint letter to the Japanese government, noted that Japan had joined a similar statement by 94 countries in July 2024, so it stepped back precisely when Washington moved to sanctions.
Akane paid a courtesy call on Takaichi in January 2026, seven months before the designation, so the government was in contact with her until shortly beforehand. No concrete support package has been offered since.
The same proximity is also what raises the temperature of the criticism. Washington sanctioned a British prosecutor and judges of several nationalities through 2025, and during that stretch the Japanese government issued no statement and public reaction was close to nil. Whether the people now criticizing the Takaichi government would have been equally angry had the president been a foreign national, that silence is the answer.
The two facts do not contradict each other. Government and public alike have set the temperature of their reaction by whether a Japanese national was involved rather than by principle. That is what left the gap between the slogan of consistent support for the ICC and the standard actually applied exposed this time. Is Japan defending the court as a matter of principle, or as protection of its own national? The ambiguity of that standard sits underneath the charge of weakness.
The cost of public condemnation
Japan’s security rests on US forces in Japan and American extended deterrence. Deterrence against China, North Korea, and Russia cannot be financed alone, and damage to the relationship with Washington is expensive.
A mid ranking LDP lawmaker was quoted saying the alliance could not be called rock solid and that picking a fight with the United States was not a good move, as Jiji Press reported. That is the structure stated plainly.
There is also the calculation that loud condemnation is unlikely to improve anything. A Foreign Ministry official was reported to have said that changing the Trump administration’s stance was unrealistic, and the State Department has said it expects allies to end their support for the ICC altogether. On that reading, if Japan raised its voice, Washington could take it as defending a politicized court, and Japan would lose its position as one of the few allies able to act as a bridge between the United States and the ICC.
Quiet diplomacy has fragments of a record behind it. Motegi has said Japan made various approaches to the United States in the past, and Japan sat on the Bureau of the Assembly of States Parties during the removal of Prosecutor Karim Khan in July. Even in Europe, where the words were stronger, the EU countermeasure has been debated for a year and a half without being activated. What Japan actually raised about these sanctions has not been made public, so this course cannot yet be judged either way.
The jurisdiction argument and sanctions on individuals are different questions
Whether the court’s jurisdiction reaches nationals of states that are not parties is genuinely disputed among international lawyers. It is not a baseless complaint, and Japan is under no obligation to rebut an ally’s reading of the law head on.
The measure taken here operates on a different level from that dispute. If a ruling or an arrest warrant is objectionable, the legal routes are appeal and treaty amendment. Freezing the personal assets of the judges who handled the case so they cannot do their work is pressure on judicial independence. That single point is where the criticism from European governments and from the court itself has concentrated.
Using that separation, there was a way to say that Japan does not enter the jurisdiction dispute but does not support the method of subjecting individual judges to financial sanctions, without ruling on the merits of the American position. The actual statement stayed general, that Japan has consistently supported the ICC and finds the measures very unfortunate, and avoided any assessment of the method. This is where the assessments divide.
A State Department spokesperson said the sanctions were directed at the ICC’s conduct and not at the Japanese government, which is Washington itself limiting the target, and can be read as leaving room for Japan to state a position on the method. At the same time, Washington is asking allies to halt their funding of the court, so the concern that stepping forward would put Japan next in line has grounds of its own. Which reading one takes changes the assessment of this response.
What Japan can do without naming the United States
At least four steps are available without condemning the United States by name. First, raising the level of the statement from the press secretary to the foreign minister, the chief cabinet secretary, or the prime minister. Second, signing the next joint statement of states parties. Third, stating clearly that a US executive order has no direct legal force inside Japan, so domestic financial institutions do not over comply and cut off Akane’s accounts and transactions. Fourth, the practical work of funding the court and supporting her continuation in office.
This has stopped being hypothetical. Akane herself has asked for it by name, saying support from Japan and from the Japanese people would be an important key. Whether the tools are used is itself the answer to the person concerned.
The response to the Etorofu visit had the same shape. Behind the strong words absolutely unacceptable and the summons of the ambassador, no further measure followed. Tighter sanctions and a temporary recall of the ambassador were reported to be under consideration, the foreign minister did not confirm them, and no one at the LDP’s division meeting demanded them. Japan also depends on Russia for about 9 percent of its LNG imports according to Ministry of Finance trade statistics for 2025, and holds stakes in Sakhalin 2. The temperature of the words toward Moscow and toward Washington runs in opposite directions, and the pattern of a blank space after the words is common to both. That is why the two charges of weakness arrived at once.
Related article
Putin Lands on Etorofu: The Day the Northern Territories Stopped Being Negotiable
The next joint statement is the test
The signals are narrow. Whether Japan signs when the states parties issue their next joint statement. Whether the level of the statement rises to a minister. Whether guidance for financial institutions or concrete support for Akane appears. The LDP is reported to be planning another foreign affairs meeting within the month to keep discussing the US response, and the Japanese Bankers Association and the three megabanks have declined to comment on the effect on transactions.
Washington has little incentive to shift its posture toward the court before midterm elections, and its statement already signals readiness for further measures. If Europe moves on the EU countermeasure that Spain and Slovenia have been seeking, whether Japan follows will be another test. Japan looks likely to continue with a quiet voice and practical support. If the practical part stays invisible, very unfortunate will keep being cited as evidence of weakness.
Japanese Reactions to the US Sanctions on ICC President Akane
Japanese conversation about the sanctions ran heavily one way. In a survey of the most widely shared posts conducted for this article on August 23, 2026, roughly eight in ten of the opinion posts on X criticized the government’s response, and the usual left right split barely formed: criticism came from an editorial in the conservative Yomiuri Shimbun as readily as from government critics. The temperature also changed over time. On August 19 the complaint was general, that Japan should have protested. From August 21, as reporting spelled out the practical damage to Akane, cards frozen and services cut off, the criticism flared again and spread an order of magnitude wider. What follows are reactions on X, not a measure of Japanese public opinion.
ICC่ตคๆ นๆ้ทใฏ่ทๅใๅ จใใใใ ใใง็ฑณๅฝใฎๅถ่ฃใๅใใใฏใฌใซใ้ปๅญๆธ็ฑใGmailใ้่กๅฃๅบงใไฝฟใใชใใชใใ
— ใฒใใใ (@hirox246) August 23, 2026
้ซๅธ้ฆ็ธใฏๅๅนดๅใซใใใฃใใๆฏๆดใใฆใใใฎใง้ ๅผตใฃใฆใปใใใใจ้กใ่ฆใฆ่จใฃใใฎใซใๆๆธ็ญใฏ่กใใใๅคงๅคๆฎๅฟตใใจ่จใใ ใใ
ใใใใๅฃๅ ใ ใใ ใจใใชในใฏใ่ฒ ใฃใฆๅใๅ ฌๅๅกใฏๆธใใใญใ https://t.co/Hz55N7J7ky
ICC President Akane was sanctioned by the United States for doing nothing more than her job, and now she cannot use credit cards, e-books, Gmail, or her bank account.
Six months ago Prime Minister Takaichi looked her in the face and told her Japan would support her firmly and that she should keep at it. Now there is no relief measure, only the words very unfortunate.
When the person at the top is all talk, fewer public servants are going to take on risky work.
Hiroyuki Nishimura, commentator
The most widely shared post of the episode turned the diplomatic question into a personnel one, setting the concrete damage to Akane against what the prime minister had told her in person in January.
้ฟใใ็ฑณ้้ฃใ่ฆๆฉใฎๆซใใICC่ตคๆ นๆฐๅถ่ฃใซ้ซๅธ้ฆ็ธใๅคงๅคๆฎๅฟตใ๏ผๆๆฅๆฐ่ https://t.co/0VpsowJXNS
— JSF (@rockfish31) August 20, 2026
"้ฆ็ธๅจ่พบใฏใไปๅใฎๅถ่ฃใฏๆฅๆฌใจใใๅฝใซๅฏพใใฆๅใใใใใใฎใงใฏใชใใใใใพใงICCใจใใ็ต็นใงใๆฅๆฌไบบใใใพใใพใใใใ ใฃใใ"
ใใพใใซใ้ ทใใๅ่ใ่ฆๆจใฆใฆไฝใไฟๅฎใใ
Criticism of the US avoided after much agonizing. Takaichi says sanctions on the ICC’s Akane are very unfortunate. Asahi Shimbun.
Quoting the article: people around the prime minister said the sanctions were not directed at Japan as a country, that they were aimed at the ICC as an organization and a Japanese national simply happened to be at its head.
This is appalling. What kind of conservatism abandons its own?
A military affairs commentator
The value of this one is that it puts the government’s own reasoning on the record. The argument that the designation targets an institution rather than Japan is precisely what the question of proximity turns on.
่ชญๅฃฒๆฐ่ใฎ่้ใใใคใฆใชใ้ญใใไปฅไธใๅผ็จใงใใ
— ๅฑฑๅฃๅจ (@shu_yamaguchi) August 21, 2026
ใ็ฑณๅฝใฎICCๅ ็ๅฝใธใฎ ๆซๅใฏๆญใใฆๅฎน่ชใงใใชใใใจใใใๆฅๆฌใฏๆๅคงใฎๅๆ ้ๆ ๅบๅฝใงใใใไปใฎๅ ็ๅฝใฎไฟกไปปใ็ตใฆ่ตคๆ นๆฐใ้ใๅบใใ่ฒฌไปปใใใใ
ใซใใใใใใใ้ซๅธ้ฆ็ธใฏ่ตคๆ นๆฐใธใฎๅถ่ฃใซใคใใฆใๅคงๅคๆฎๅฟตใใจ่ฟฐในใใซใจใฉใใใโฆ
The Yomiuri Shimbun’s language here is sharper than I have ever seen it. Quoting the editorial:
American intimidation of ICC member states is absolutely unacceptable. Japan in particular is the largest contributor of assessed funds, and bears a responsibility for having sent Akane to the court with the confidence of the other member states. […] Can Japan, faced with American pressure, not even show the resolve to defend its own national’s right to continue in her post, let alone the rule of law?
It really is disappointing.
Shu Yamaguchi, author
That the sharpest language came from the Yomiuri Shimbun, a conservative paper, is part of why the usual left right axis never formed on this issue.
ใ่งฃ่ชฌใ้ซๅธ็ท็ใICC่ตคๆ นๆบๅญๆ้ทใธใฎ็ฑณๅฝๅถ่ฃใซใคใใฆใๆฎๅฟตใใจใณใกใณใใใ็็ฑโฆ https://t.co/WmaIJ3mPTj
— Ryoichi Nakagawa ใ่ซ่/่่จผใใณใฉใ (@Ronko_Kosho) August 20, 2026
Explainer: why Prime Minister Takaichi called the US sanctions on ICC President Tomoko Akane regrettable. […] Behind a response that avoided strong protest lies a deep diplomatic dilemma.
1. Caught between supporting an international institution and deferring to Washington. Japan is the ICC’s largest financial contributor. When Akane paid a courtesy call on January 7, the prime minister said clearly that even in a harsh international environment Japan values the rule of law and that the Japanese government would give strong support to the ICC and to President Akane so the court can play its role. […] Holding the language at regrettable was an extremely careful choice, one that does not repudiate the position she took in January while avoiding a decisive rupture with an ally.
2. Washington is prepared to dismantle the ICC, and Japan risks being seen as defending it politically. […] If Japan raised the level of political protest at this moment, there is a risk the United States would read it as Japan defending a politicized court, which could put the ICC’s neutrality and Japan’s own standing in greater danger.
[…]
4. A clash over sovereignty under Article 12 of the Rome Statute. […] Because of the structural problem in Article 12, which allows the court to extend jurisdiction to nationals of states that are not parties, there is a clear argument on the American side that this is an excessive use of authority.
[…]
In closing. Prime Minister Takaichi’s single word, regrettable, is not simply weak diplomacy. It is an extremely realist political decision, an attempt to balance the defense of norms Japan upholds as an ICC member state against the security reality of the Japan US alliance.
A commentary account
The clearest defense of quiet diplomacy came from a commentary account rather than from any politician. It was shared far less than the critical posts, and posts arguing straightforwardly that Japan simply cannot confront an ally were hard to find at all. In Japanese, the case for the government’s choice exists mainly as an explanation of a bind rather than as an argument anyone is making with conviction.
Whether This Was Weakness Will Show in the Measures
Showing support in words, or in measures
Take the phrase very unfortunate on its own and it reads as weakness. Bring in the structure of the alliance and it reads as unavoidable. Each conclusion is half of the picture. Separate the jurisdiction dispute from pressure on the judiciary, and measures remain that do not require a head on collision with the ally. Japan has not used them yet.
Akane left a sentence behind: support from Japan and from the Japanese people would be an important key. A country that has made the rule of law its calling card has been tested on that card by its own ally. What it offers as proof of support will become visible in two forms, whether it signs the next joint statement, and what the support package actually contains.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why did the United States sanction ICC President Tomoko Akane?
The US State Department’s press statement of August 18, 2026 designated Akane and Senior Trial Lawyer Abdoulaye Seye under Executive Order 14203 for direct engagement in efforts to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute officials of governments that have not consented to the court’s jurisdiction. The statement did not identify any specific decision by Akane, and framed the designations as part of a campaign launched in July 2026 to dismantle the court.
How did Japan respond to the sanctions on Akane?
With words and no countermeasures. According to the Japanese Foreign Ministry’s press secretary statement of August 19, 2026, Japan has consistently supported the ICC and the announced measures are very unfortunate, and Japan would keep working on the rule of law while maintaining communication with related countries. Foreign Minister Motegi declined on August 20 to say whether Japan would seek withdrawal of the sanctions, saying only that Japan had made various approaches to the United States in the past.
What could Japan do without publicly condemning the United States?
Four steps are available. Raising the statement from the press secretary to the foreign minister or prime minister, signing the next joint statement of states parties after skipping the one by 79 countries in February 2025, stating that a US executive order has no direct legal force in Japan so that domestic banks do not over comply and freeze Akane’s accounts, and continuing practical support for the court and for her work. Akane asked for Japanese support by name in a comment released on August 21, 2026.
How did Japanese social media react to the US sanctions on ICC President Akane?
Reaction on X was overwhelmingly critical of the government: in a survey of the most widely shared posts conducted for this article on August 23, 2026, roughly eight in ten of the opinion posts faulted the response, and the criticism crossed the usual political divide, including citations of a Yomiuri Shimbun editorial. The volume rose sharply from August 21, when reporting detailed the practical effects on Akane such as loss of access to credit cards and online services. Posts defending the government were scarce and framed the choice as a bind between supporting the ICC and managing the alliance rather than as a positive case.
Sekahan on YouTube
We publish video summaries of articles like this one, along with short clips built around Japanese reactions.
Reference Links
- Advancing the United States Campaign to Address the Threat Posed by the International Criminal Court๏ฝU.S. Department of State
- US Sanctions Against the International Criminal Court, statement by the Press Secretary (Japanese)๏ฝMinistry of Foreign Affairs of Japan
- Visit by Russian President Putin to the Northern Territories, statement by the Foreign Minister (Japanese)๏ฝMinistry of Foreign Affairs of Japan
- Press conference by Foreign Minister Motegi in Muscat, August 20, 2026 (Japanese)๏ฝMinistry of Foreign Affairs of Japan
- Press conference by Foreign Minister Motegi, July 24, 2026 (Japanese)๏ฝMinistry of Foreign Affairs of Japan
- LDP discusses Russia and ICC issues, no calls for tougher sanctions on Russia (Japanese)๏ฝReuters
- New US sanctions against the International Criminal Court๏ฝFrance Diplomatie
- Joint statement, Sanctions International Criminal Court (ICC)๏ฝGovernment of the Netherlands
