By Colin Robertson

July 30, 2026

The International Criminal Court is flawed, frustrating, and indispensable. It is also a prototype of what multilateralism will likely look like going forward; a coalition of like-minded states on a specific issue.

Canada played a central role in the creation of the ICC but now, as the United States leads a campaign to discredit and disable it, Canada must again defend the principles of law and accountability the court represents. The answer to its failings is reform, not demolition.

The ICC is not perfect. It secures too few convictions, takes too long to complete cases and depends upon governments that frequently refuse to arrest its suspects. Its internal culture has been tarnished by allegations of bullying, harassment and abuse of authority.

Last week, in a vote by 82 of its 125 members,  the governing body of the ICC removed from office its chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, over allegations of coercive and non-consensual sexual behaviour over an extended period.

Their decision confirms the seriousness of these problems — but also the court’s capacity for accountability.

The lesson is not that the ICC should be dismantled, as demanded by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio. It is that an institution created to challenge impunity must enforce accountability within its own walls.

The Office of the Prosecutor is bruised but operational. Arrest warrants authorized by ICC judges remain unaffected.

The ICC embodies a straightforward principle: those responsible for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes should not be protected indefinitely by political office, military power, or national borders. It acts only when national authorities are unwilling or genuinely unable to investigate and prosecute. It is a backstop to national justice, not a substitute for it.

Canadians played lead roles in its creation.

Canadian diplomat Philippe Kirsch chaired the decisive negotiations at the 1998 Rome Conference, where 120 states voted to establish the first permanent international criminal court. Canada also chaired the Like-Minded Group — the coalition that built support for a strong, independent court. Kirsch later became the ICC’s first president.

Louise Arbour’s role was different but equally important. As chief prosecutor of the international tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, she helped create the jurisprudence and political momentum from which the permanent court emerged. Her indictment of Yugoslav president Slobodan Milošević demonstrated that international justice could reach serving leaders, not merely defeated functionaries.

Kirsch helped build the institution. Arbour demonstrated both its effectiveness and why it was necessary.

Now, Canada must defend another distinguished Canadian jurist.

Judge Kimberly Prost, on the ICC bench since 2018, was one of several ICC members sanctioned by the United States over a judicial ruling authorizing an investigation into the alleged involvement of U.S. Forces and other U.S. officials in possible war crimes in Afghanistan.

The sanctions effectively bar her from entry to the U.S. and from transactions involving U.S. companies. As Prost told the Irish Times, “it’s surreal” to suddenly not be able to use credit cards or access online services.

The ICC is already an example of the variable geometry and coalitions of the willing that Prime Minister Mark Carney argues will increasingly define international affairs.

Former foreign minister Lloyd Axworthy and former justice minister and UN ambassador Allan Rock rightly argue that Canada should do more to support Prost and reject the intimidation of ICC judges and staff. Judicial independence means little if a great power can punish judges personally for rulings it dislikes.

Prost’s nine-year term will soon end. Ottawa should already be preparing to sustain Canada’s contribution to the bench by putting forward a Canadian jurist with criminal-trial experience, independence, and unimpeachable integrity.

The ICC’s record is mixed but meaningful. It convicted Congolese rebel leader Thomas Lubanga for recruiting child soldiers; his deputy, Bosco Ntaganda, for murder, rape, and sexual slavery; Malian militia member Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi for destroying Timbuktu’s cultural heritage; and Uganda guerrilla leader Dominic Ongwen for 61 war crimes and crimes against humanity.

It has issued warrants against Russian President Vladimir Putin over the unlawful deportation of Ukrainian children and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over alleged crimes in Gaza. Former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte was transferred to The Hague in 2025 to face trial in November this year on three counts of murder as crimes against humanity relating to his campaign against drugs.

The allegations against these leaders must still be proven. That is what trials are for. The principle is not that prosecutors are invariably right. It is that no leader should be above the law.

Here, Australian scholar and co-founder of The National Interest, Owen Harries, offers a useful warning. A realist, Harries did not reject morality in foreign policy. Harries rejected moralism — the reduction of difficult choices to contests between absolute virtue and absolute evil, arguing that morality detached from prudence, evidence, and consequences produces hypocrisy and overreach.

That caution applies to the ICC. Prosecutors require judgment as well as conviction. Courts must respect due process. Warrants must rest upon credible evidence. The Khan affair underlines the need for institutional humility and internal accountability.

Harries’ realism also rebukes the court’s enemies. A world in which Russia, China, Israel or the United States claims exemption by virtue of power is tyranny masquerading as sovereignty. Realism recognizes that power matters. It does not accept that power is self-justifying.

This is why the U.S. campaign to dismantle the court is so dangerous.

Washington has legitimate jurisdictional concerns about a treaty it never ratified. But sanctioning judges and prosecutors, disrupting their access to essential services, pressuring countries to withdraw support and promising to “systematically disable” the court is no longer a legal disagreement. Axworthy and Rock call this “coercion dressed up as policy.” Canada should resist—firmly and without apology.

The ICC is already an example of the variable geometry and coalitions of the willing that Prime Minister Mark Carney argues will increasingly define international affairs. Its 125 members have accepted common obligations and a shared system of rules-based justice. They do not need the permission of the 70 states outside the system to uphold the commitments they made to one another.

Multilateralism has never required unanimity.

The United Nations began in 1945 with 51 members. It now has 193. Its founders did not wait until every government agreed with them. They began with states willing to accept the Charter and built outward.

The same principle must guide multilateralism now. The objective is not universal agreement before anyone can act. It is effective co-operation among countries that share principles, accept reciprocal obligations and respect agreed rules.

Canada should organize European partners, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand and supportive African and Latin American democracies to protect the ICC while encouraging better investigations, merit-based judicial appointments, independent workplace oversight, and a credible process for choosing Khan’s successor.

Canada helped build the court through a coalition of the willing. It must now resist predatory coercion and assemble another coalition to preserve and reform it.

Contributing Writer Colin Robertson,C.M., C.D, a former career diplomat, is a fellow and host of the Global Exchange podcast with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute in Ottawa.