International Criminal Court President Tomoko Akane has warned against “the demise of international rule of law” after being targeted by US sanctions.

“The sanction against me this time was something I had anticipated to an extent, so I’m not surprised,” Akane said in a statement released on X by her publisher Bungei Shunju on Friday.

“The important thing is not to let this be the beginning of the demise of international rule of law.”

In July, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio launched an ongoing campaign to dismantle the ICC. Rubio labeled the court a “corrupt and fatally politicized supranational court that has maliciously abused its authority” and urged its 125 member states to withdraw, declaring his intention to dismantle it “brick by brick.”

The US State Department announced that the unprecedented move aims to “systematically disable the ICC’s ability to operate.” A US official added that Washington would “watch with interest” to see which countries heeded Rubio’s call to pull out and which did not.

US President Donald Trump openly admitted that Rubio’s efforts to undermine the ICC were aimed at shielding the Israeli regime’s leader from prosecution.

During a Cabinet meeting at Camp David in July, Trump revealed that Rubio was working to “save Bibi and others” from the ICC.

On August 18, the Trump administration sanctioned Akane, a Japanese national, along with Abdoulaye Seye of Senegal, a senior trial lawyer in the court’s prosecution office.

In recent years, Trump administrations have repeatedly targeted ICC judges and prosecutors, citing the court’s investigations involving US personnel and its arrest warrants for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former minister of military affairs Yoav Gallant as a threat to American and Israeli interests and security.

Akane’s statement on Friday marked her first public reaction since the sanctions were imposed. She was elected to a three-year term as ICC president in March 2024 and has served as a judge at the court since March 2018.

On Wednesday, the ICC condemned the US sanctions as a “flagrant attack” against its officials. The measures are widely viewed as retaliation for the court’s investigations into the Israeli regime’s crimes against the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples in the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon.

The court noted that the Trump administration has now sanctioned nine of its 18 judges, both deputy prosecutors, and its former chief prosecutor, describing the action as a “flagrant attack against the independence of an impartial judicial institution.”

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk and senior EU officials expressed support for Akane and the ICC.

Founded in 2002 and rooted in the post-World War II drive to establish the rule of law worldwide, the ICC serves as a court of last resort. It provides a pathway toward peace by prosecuting individuals charged with severe criminal acts and grave atrocities in countries that lack adequate legal systems to ensure accountability.