abuses

What happens when those meant to enforce the law are the ones who break it?

For many in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital city in the North Central, before 2024, the answer lay in the abrupt, often unceremonious, motor checks conducted by Vehicle Inspection Officers (VIOs). To many motorists, these inspections, which were meant to ensure the roadworthiness of vehicles, appeared instead as an avenue for these officers to extort unlawful payments. 

Mubarak Muhammed*, a cybersecurity specialist, who once faced such a situation, said:

“I was stopped by these officers and asked to pay ₦9,000 for no reason. They searched my car but never found anything wrong with it, yet they still asked me to pay. I begged for them to let me go because at the time, I was low on funds, with only ₦11,000 in my account. Well, I ended up paying the money, but it wasn’t enough. Their Oga [referring to the senior officer] entered my car and told me I had to settle him privately, that he knew I had money, so I should give him ₦50,000.” At that point, Mubarak said he called his father, who sent their driver to retrieve the car. Only then did the officers back down. 

Stories like Mubarak’s are commonplace on the streets of Abuja, with ongoing claims by some motorists that extortive car searches were a day-to-day stressor. The issue was so rampant that in 2016, the Nigerian newspaper Daily Trust wrote an article summarising the concerns of many. In it, frustrated Abuja drivers expressed their displeasure with the car searches that left their pockets drained. 

Over the years, the issue has not faded. In 2024, some residents took to social media, their anger at the VIO system bitterly typed out. One user, in an essay posted on Reddit, expressed their disbelief over being fined ₦75,000 for allegedly beating a red light, an accusation they denied.

This slow-cooking pot of complaints finally reached its boiling point. Towards the end of 2024, human rights activist and lawyer Abubakar Marshal filed a lawsuit against the Federal Capital Territory Directorate of the Road Traffic Services (FCT-DRTS), commonly known as VIO. He argued that no law allowed the officers or related agents to stop, impound, confiscate, seize, or impose fines on motorists.

The judge, Evelyn Maha of the Federal High Court, Abuja, ruled in favour of Abubakar’s argument. On October 2, 2024, the court barred the VIO in FCT from carrying out such actions. 

The ruling was met with jubilation. On X, the microblogging site, one user said, “This is great news,” while another called it “Long overdue.”

But the victory was short-lived. The directorate quickly opposed the judgment and sought an appeal. A consensus was never reached, and so the initial judgment stayed in place: VIO vanished from Abuja’s bustling streets, vehicles went around without inspections, and motorists adjusted to a city without the officers.

That was until technology offered the officers a way back onto the roads

In February 2025, just four months after the ruling, the VIO unveiled an Automated Number Plate Recognition system (ANPR system) that allowed the officers to digitally check plate numbers and ensure all of a vehicle’s credentials were in place. Abdullateef Bello, the FCT-DRTS director, said the system had “legal backing.” It was a way to subvert the issues posed by the barring. Physical checks had been banned, but tech-geared ones hadn’t.

“We are embracing technology in our activities. We have even started,” Kalu Emetu, the spokesperson of the VIO in Abuja, told HumAngle. “Once you have committed certain offences, there will be no need for officers to go after you. What you will get is an e-ticket from us, and you will go and pay into a designated account which belongs to the government.” 

Digitally armed, the officers returned to the city’s streets in February, sliding back as if they never left. But, just as easily as they came back, so did the issues. 

For starters, some motorists told HumAngle that the technology was abandoned before it could even settle, and in less than a year, physical inspections have made a full comeback to the streets of Abuja, though this defies the legal bounds of their return. 

Hadiza Balal*, a 23-year-old learner driver, fell prey to one of these searches in June.

“I was flagged down in Mpape and asked to pull over. At the time, my car papers were expired, so when I was stopped, I knew I was entering a situation I would not easily escape.” 

The officer leaned his head through the window, eyes darting around the interior of the car in search. Finally, after what felt like an eternity to Hadiza, the officer asked her for the thing she feared he would: her car papers.

“When he noticed they had expired, he demanded I pay a fine. I thought the most he would ask for was ₦5,000, but he insisted I give him ₦27,000 to renew my papers,” she recounted. 

This process not only rattled Hadiza, but also stood in direct violation of what the officers were now allowed to do on the road. Physical papers were meant to be viewed on computerised devices, and checks were meant to be done with a quick scan of Hadiza’s plate number, not with the officer halfway into the driver’s seat.

What’s more, when Hadiza finally paid him, there was no e-ticketing as promised, just a demanded transaction that left her suspicious. 

“I managed to persuade the officer to lower the fine to ₦26,500, which would also cover the cost of renewing my documents,” she said, seeming frustrated. “But when I inquired about paying the fine at his station, he insisted that I pay him directly.”

Hadiza didn’t leave until a transfer was made into an account that, she claimed, could never belong to any official organisation. “It was a personal account,” she stated. “A first and last name, with no indication that the account belonged to the government.”

The moment the transfer was done, the officer’s attitude mellowed. The officer who’d been arguing with her was suddenly kind. But even after this struggle, Hadiza faced a second round of problems at the VIO office, where she went to renew the papers.

She described the place as cramped and stifling. The officers ignored her for several minutes before one approached her — not to assist, but to harass.

“He called me “baby girl” and told me I was his girlfriend. I wanted to punch him when he touched my leg, saying he wanted to get to know me more, but I didn’t do anything because I wanted the process to go fast so I could go home,” she recounted. 

Hadiza eventually renewed the documents. 

While some, like Hadiza, leave physical searches unopposed, others demand their right to a digital check, yet, even with their resistance, they are denied the right. 

At Life Camp roundabout in Abuja Municipal Area, Daniel Livinus was stopped by an officer who followed due protocol, only to be hounded by a second officer who didn’t.

“The first one came and scanned my plate number. He didn’t even say anything, just scanned and left,” Daniel recounted. “Not less than a minute later, another one came and asked me to show him my particulars. I said, “Ah, but you can check it on your phone now.” That’s all it took for the man to start shouting, “Will you be the one to teach me my job?”

The fight got heated, so much so that the first officer and a random passerby went to mitigate the situation. David said that both men sided with the aggrieved officer, saying that he should obey because the officer is “doing his job”. 

“If he followed normal protocol, I wouldn’t have had an issue with him,” Daniel added. 

While some motorists are denied the use of the technology, others face issues with it. Sometimes, when scans don’t go through, the officers use that as an incentive to fine motorists who haven’t done wrong.

For Nanlian Mamven, a 21-year-old youth corps member, his car, registered in Plateau State, made him a victim of this issue.

“VIO stopped me at a traffic light and ran my plate number through this new app,” he recounted. “The app is supposed to bring out all your registration information. Still, my details didn’t pop up for some reason, most likely because my car was registered in Plateau, and I think the app only covers FCT-registered cars. It should have been fine because I still had my valid registration papers, but the officers entered the back of my car, told me to drive to their station, and demanded I pay ₦ 28,000.”

Unlike the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), which oversees traffic regulation across the entire country, the Vehicle Inspection Office is run by state governments and the FCT Authority. This means that systems or technologies introduced in the FCT, such as the ANPR app, may not apply uniformly in other states. As a result, vehicles registered outside the FCT often face complications when subjected to Abuja’s digital checks.

Nanlian soon realised this was not just a technical glitch but an extortion attempt. Only after he contacted his mother’s friend, a senior officer, did the demands vanish.

“The senior officer I called said no, the money they were asking for wasn’t the proposed money they should have called, so clearly they had added something to it. When I gave the phone to one of them, they hastily told me I could go. That was how I escaped that day,” he said.

Yet, even then, the ordeal did not end smoothly. Back home, Nanlian discovered his headphones and groceries missing from the backseat, items he claimed disappeared only after the officers entered his car.

“I put two-and-two together and realised they had taken my things,” he said, a claim we could not independently verify. “But at that point, I just let the matter go. Where was I going to start from?” 

The sense of helplessness he expressed seemed to be a recurring thing for many drivers. It didn’t matter if it was a plate number scanning or a physical search; one thing is clear: many of Abuja’s motorists feel slighted by the city’s vehicle inspection system.

When HumAngle contacted the VIO spokesperson with these allegations, he pushed back. Kalu argued that the problem lay less with officers and more with the motorists. 

“We’ve been having these accusations that our people collect their own share,” he told HumAngle. “But you know, people frame the story the way they want. What the present managers of the directorate are doing now is ensuring that technology takes over most of the activities. For example, if you are fined and told where you are going to pay, you wouldn’t have any reason to blame the person who stopped you because you’ve been given a specific government-owned account to pay into.”

Yet, for drivers like Hadiza, Daniel, and Nanlian, the gap between promise and practice remains wide. If nothing changes, more motorists may teeter to the extreme that Hadiza did when asked how she plans to handle driving in Abuja, sometimes abandoning their cars altogether and risking the city’s notorious “one-chance” cabs.

“I can’t lie to you,” she breathed out in frustration, “I think I now hate driving.” 

Names marked with an asterisk (*) have been changed to protect the identities of sources.

Fund said decision against Caterpillar and five Israeli banks due to their contribution ‘to serious violations of rights in situations of war and conflict’.

Norway’s $2-trillion wealth fund, the largest in the world, has divested from US construction equipment giant Caterpillar over the firm’s purported involvement in rights violations perpetrated by the Israeli military in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

The Norwegian central bank said on Monday that it had decided to exclude Caterpillar from the fund, which it manages, “due to an unacceptable risk that the companies contribute to serious violations of the rights of individuals in situations of war and conflict”.

The fund also announced that it had divested from five Israeli banks, based on the recommendation of its council on ethics.

In a statement, the ethics council said that “bulldozers manufactured by Caterpillar are being used by Israeli authorities in the widespread unlawful destruction of Palestinian property”.

“There is no doubt that Caterpillar’s products are being used to commit extensive and systematic violations of international humanitarian law,” the council said.

It added that Caterpillar had “not implemented any measures to prevent such use” by Israeli authorities.

Prior to its divestment, the fund held a 1.17 percent stake in Caterpillar valued at $2.1bn as of June 30, according to fund data.

The five banks named in the fund’s statement were Hapoalim, Bank Leumi, Mizrahi Tefahot Bank, First International Bank of Israel and FIBI Holdings.

The ethics council said the banks excluded had, “by providing financial services that are a necessary prerequisite for construction activity in Israeli settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem … contributed to the maintenance of Israeli settlements”.

“The settlements have been established in violation of international law, and their continued existence constitutes an ongoing breach of international law,” the council said.

Just last year, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israeli settlements built on Palestinian territory seized in 1967 should end “as rapidly as possible”, as they “have been established and are being maintained in violation of international law”.

Last week, 21 countries signed a joint statement condemning Israel’s plans to build an illegal settlement on a 12 sq km (4.6 sq-mile) tract of land east of Jerusalem known as “East 1” or “E1”.

The massive construction, which envisions 3,400 new homes for Israeli settlers, cuts off most of the occupied West Bank from occupied East Jerusalem.

Hailing the plan, Israel’s far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, said the extent of the settlement and its cutting into Palestinian territory would bury the possibility of a future Palestinian state “because there is nothing to recognise and no one to recognise”.

The Norwegian fund’s stakes in the five Israeli banks were valued at a combined $661m, according to fund data.

Caterpillar, Hapoalim, First International Bank of Israel and Bank Leumi did not immediately reply to emailed requests for comment by the Reuters news agency.

The fund had announced on August 18 that it would divest from six companies as part of an ongoing ethics review over the war in Gaza and the situation in the occupied West Bank, but declined at the time to name any groups until its stakes in the entities were sold.

The fund is invested in some 8,400 companies worldwide.

LOBATERA, Venezuela — Carlos Uzcátegui tightly hugged his sobbing wife and stepdaughter on Wednesday as the morning fog in western Venezuela lifted. The family’s first embrace in more than a year finally convinced him that his nightmare inside a prison in El Salvador was over.

Uzcátegui was among the migrants being reunited with loved ones after four months in prison in El Salvador, where the U.S. government transferred them in one of its boldest moves to crack down on immigration.

“Every day, we asked God for the blessing of freeing us from there so that we could be here with family, with my loved ones,” Uzcátegui, 33, said. “Every day, I woke up looking at the bars, wishing I wasn’t there.”

“They beat us, they kicked us. I even have quite a few bruises on my stomach,” he added later showing a mildly bruised left abdomen.

The migrants, some of whom characterized the prison as “hell,” were freed Friday in a prisoner swap between the U.S. and Venezuelan governments, but the latter sequestered them upon arrival to their country.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and other officials have said many of the immigrants were physically and psychologically tortured during their detention in El Salvador, airing on state television videos of some of the men describing the alleged abuse, including rape, severe beatings and pellet-gun wounds. The narratives are reminiscent of the abuses that Maduro’s government has long been accused of committing against its real or perceived, jailed opponents.

As the men reached their homes, they and their relatives shared deeply emotional moments in which sad tears and happy tears rolled down their cheeks at the same time.

Uzcátegui’s wife, Gabriela Mora, 30, held onto their home’s fence and sobbed as she saw the military vehicle carrying him approach after a 30-plus-hour bus ride to their mining community nestled in Venezuela’s Andean mountains. She had set up gifts and decorations in their living room, including a star-shaped metallic blue balloon with a “Happy Father’s Day” greeting that his stepdaughter had saved since the June holiday.

‘We met a lot of innocent people’

The 252 men ended in El Salvador on March 16 after the administration of President Trump agreed to pay $6 million to the Central American nation to house them in a mega-prison, where human rights groups have documented hundreds of deaths and cases of torture. Trump accused the men of belonging to the violent Tren de Aragua street gang, which originated in Venezuela.

The administration did not provide evidence to back up the accusation. However, several recently deported migrants have said U.S. authorities wrongly judged their tattoos and used them as an excuse to deport them.

Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello on Friday said only seven of the men had pending cases in Venezuela, adding that all the deportees would undergo medical tests and background checks before they could go home.

Arturo Suárez, whose reggaeton songs surfaced on social media after he was sent to El Salvador, arrived at his family’s working-class home in the capital, Caracas, on Tuesday. His sister hugged him after he exited a vehicle of Venezuela’s intelligence service.

“It is hell. We met a lot of innocent people,” Suárez told reporters, referring to the prison he was held in. “To all those who mistreated us, to all those who negotiated with our lives and our freedom, I have one thing to say, and scripture says it well: Vengeance and justice is mine, and you are going to give an account to God the Father.”

The Associated Press could not verify the abuse allegations that Suárez and other migrants narrated in the videos aired by state media.

Atty. Gen. Tarek William Saab on Monday said he had opened an investigation against El Salvador President Nayib Bukele based on the deportees’ allegations. Bukele’s office did not respond to requests for comment.

Appointment to seek asylum

The men left El Salvador as part of a prisoner exchange with the U.S., which received 10 citizens and permanent residents whom Maduro’s government had jailed over accusations of plotting to destabilize Venezuela.

Mora said her husband migrated after the coal mine he had long worked at halved his pay and their street food shop went out of business in 2023. Uzcátegui left Lobatera in March 2024 with an acquaintance’s promise to help him find a construction job in Orlando.

On his way north, Uzcátegui crossed the punishing Darien Gap that separates Colombia and Panama, and by mid-April he had reached Mexico City. There, he worked at a public market’s seafood stall until early December, when he was finally granted an appointment through a U.S. government smartphone app to seek asylum at a border crossing.

But Uzcátegui never walked free in the U.S., where authorities regarded his tattoos with suspicion, said Mora. He was sent to a detention center in Texas until he and other Venezuelans were put on the airplanes that landed in El Salvador. Still, she said she does not regret supporting her husband’s decision to migrate.

“It’s the country’s situation that forces one to make these decisions,” she said. “If [economic] conditions here were favorable … it wouldn’t have been necessary for him to leave to be able to fix the house or to provide my daughter with a better education.”

Cano writes for the Associated Press.

A former security guard who worked at Gaza Humanitarian Foundation ‘aid distribution sites’ described to Israeli media abuses he witnessed firsthand, including the potentially lethal use of pepper spray and tear gas.

Lawyers for victims of human rights abuses committed during Peru’s decades-long armed conflict have pledged to appeal to international bodies to overturn a law passed by the country’s Congress, which would grant amnesty to prosecuted military and police members, as well as other forces.

“We’re not only going to the domestic arena to seek its invalidation, but we’ve already taken some action at the international level,” lawyer Gloria Cano, director of the Pro Human Rights Association, said during a news conference on Thursday.

A congressional commission on Wednesday approved the bill granting amnesty to members of the armed forces, national police and local self-defence committees, said legislator Alejandro Cavero, third vice president of the country’s Congress.

Cano also said her association had already alerted the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and planned to go to the United Nations, as well.

After the Peruvian Congress passed the bill, Volker Turk, the UN’s national human rights coordinator, said on X that “impunity does not hide the crime, it magnifies it.”

Amnesty International earlier urged the legislature to side with victims and reject the bill. “The right to justice of thousands of victims of extrajudicial executions, forced disappearances, torture, and sexual violence would be violated,” the rights group said on X.

A coalition of human rights organisations in Peru said the new law could wipe out 156 convictions and another 600 cases that are being prosecuted.

The law, which awaits President Dina Boluarte’s approval, benefits uniformed personnel who were accused, are still being investigated or are being tried for crimes stemming from their participation in the country’s armed conflict from 1980 to 2000 against left-wing rebels. Boluarte has not made any comment on the amnesty, even before its passage.

The bill was presented by Congressman Fernando Rospigliosi, from the right-wing Popular Force party of Keiko Fujimori, daughter of the late former leader Alberto Fujimori.

Fujimori’s decade as president from 1990 was marked by ruthless governance.

He was jailed for atrocities – including the massacre of civilians by the army – but released from prison in 2023 on humanitarian grounds.

The new law specifies that a humanitarian amnesty will be granted to people more than 70 years old who have been sentenced or served a prison sentence.

Critics have warned that the legislation would hinder the search for truth about the period of violent conflict, which pitted state forces against Shining Path and Tupac Amaru rebels, and killed about 70,000 people.

“Granting amnesty to military and police officers cannot be a reason for impunity,” Congressman Alex Flores of the Socialist Party said during debate on the bill.

There have been numerous attempts in recent years to shield the military and police from prosecution in Peru for crimes committed during the conflict – but opponents of amnesty have found success before at international bodies.

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights has at least twice previously declared amnesty laws in Peru invalid for violating the right to justice and breaching international human rights standards.

Human rights advocates believe that Peru’s membership of the Inter-American System of Human Rights and the obligations this entails make the amnesty law unconstitutional.

Amnesty laws passed in 1995 in Peru shielded military and police personnel from prosecution for human rights abuses committed during the conflict, including massacres, torture, and forced disappearances.

Peru’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission found that the majority of the conflict’s victims were Indigenous Peruvians caught between security forces and the Shining Path. It also found that there are more than 4,000 clandestine graves across the country as a result of the two decades of political violence.

In August 2024, Peru adopted a statute of limitations for crimes against humanity committed before 2002, shutting down hundreds of investigations into alleged crimes committed during the conflict.

The initiative benefitted the late Fujimori and 600 prosecuted military personnel.

UNITED NATIONS — The Trump administration announced Wednesday that it is issuing sanctions against an independent investigator tasked with probing human rights abuses in the Palestinian territories, the latest effort by the United States to punish critics of Israel’s 21-month war in Gaza.

The State Department’s decision to impose sanctions on Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza, follows an unsuccessful U.S. pressure campaign to force the international body to remove her from her post. It also comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is visiting Washington this week to meet with President Trump and other officials about the war in Gaza and more.

It’s unclear what the practical impact the sanctions will have and whether the independent investigator will be able to travel to the U.S. with diplomatic paperwork.

Albanese, an Italian human rights lawyer, has been vocal about what she has described as the “genocide” by Israel against Palestinians in Gaza. Both Israel and the U.S., which provides military support to its close ally, have strongly denied that accusation.

The U.S. had not previously addressed concerns with Albanese head-on because it has not participated in either of the two Human Rights Council sessions this year, including the summer session that ended Tuesday. This is because the Trump administration withdrew the U.S. earlier this year.

Albanese has urged countries to pressure Israel

In recent weeks, Albanese has issued a series of letters urging other countries to pressure Israel, including through sanctions, to end its deadly bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

She has also been a strong supporter of the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants against Israeli officials, including Netanyahu, for allegations of war crimes. She most recently issued a report naming several large U.S. companies as among those aiding what she described as Israel’s occupation and war on Gaza.

“Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted on social media. “We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defense.”

Liz Evenson, international justice director at Human Rights Watch, said the U.S. government’s decision to sanction Albanese for seeking justice through the ICC “is actually all about silencing a U.N. expert for doing her job — speaking truth about Israeli violations against Palestinians and calling on governments and corporations not to be complicit.”

“The United States is working to dismantle the norms and institutions on which survivors of grave abuses rely,” Evenson said in a statement. “U.N. and ICC member countries should strongly resist the U.S. government’s shameless efforts to block justice for the world’s worst crimes and condemn the outrageous sanctions on Albanese.”

Albanese’s July 1 report focuses on Western defense companies that have provided weapons used by Israel’s military, as well as manufacturers of earth-moving equipment that have bulldozed Palestinian homes and property.

It cites activities by companies in the shipping, real estate, technology, banking and finance and online travel industries, as well as academia.

“While life in Gaza is being obliterated and the West Bank is under escalating assault, this report shows why Israel’s genocide continues: because it is lucrative for many,” her report said.

A request for comment from the U.N.’s top human rights body was not immediately returned.

Israel strongly refutes Albanese’s allegations

Israel’s diplomatic mission in Geneva, where the 47-member Human Rights Council is based, called Albanese’s report “legally groundless, defamatory, and a flagrant abuse of her office” and having “whitewashed Hamas atrocities.”

Outside experts, such as Albanese, do not represent the United Nations and have no formal authority. However, they report to the council as a means of monitoring countries’ human rights records.

Albanese has faced criticism from pro-Israel officials and groups in the U.S. and in the Middle East. The U.S. mission to the U.N. issued a scathing statement last week, calling for her removal for “a years-long pattern of virulent anti-Semitism and unrelenting anti-Israel bias.”

The statement said Albanese’s allegations of Israel committing genocide or apartheid are “false and offensive.”

Israel’s ambassador to the U.N., Danny Danon, celebrated the U.S. action, saying in a statement Wednesday that Albanese’s “relentless and biased campaign against Israel and the United States has long crossed the line from human rights advocacy into political warfare.”

Trump administration’s campaign to quiet criticism of Israel

It is a culmination of a nearly six-month campaign by the Trump administration to quell criticism of Israel’s handling of the war in Gaza. Earlier this year, the administration began arresting and trying to deport faculty and students of U.S. universities who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations and other political activities.

The war between Israel and Hamas began Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants stormed into Israel and killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took 251 people captive. Israel’s retaliatory campaign has killed over 57,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which says women and children make up most of the dead but does not specify how many were fighters or civilians.

Nearly 21 months into the conflict that displaced the vast majority of Gaza’s 2.3 million people, it is nearly impossible for the critically wounded to get the care they need, doctors and aid workers say.

“We must stop this genocide, whose short-term goal is completing the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, while also profiteering from the killing machine devised to perform it,” Albanese said in a recent post on X. “No one is safe until everyone is safe.”

Amiri writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Jamey Keaten in Geneva contributed to this report.

July 9 (UPI) — The United States has sanctioned an independent investigator of human rights abuses in the Palestinian territories, in latest move by the Trump administration targeting critics of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.

Francesca Paola Albanese, the 48-year-old Italian-born U.N. special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza, was sanctioned by the State Department on Wednesday.

The sanctions come as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits Washington, D.C., and follow the publication of a recent report by Albanese calling for punitive measures to be imposed against Israel over what she describes as its “genocide” of the Palestinian people, while criticizing dozens of businesses for profiting off the conflict.

The State Department issued its secondary sanctions on the grounds of Albanese’s support of the ICC.

The Trump administration sanctioned the ICC last month after the court opened an investigation into the actions of U.S. personnel in Afghanistan and issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on allegations of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in their widespread, systematic assault on Gaza.

Albanese has called on countries to comply with the ICC arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said her support of the ICC is “a gross infringement on the sovereignty” of the United States and Israel, as neither party is a member of the international court.

“The United States has repeatedly condemned and objected to the biased and malicious activities of Albanese that have long made her unfit for service as a special rapporteur,” Rubio said in a statement.

He also chastised her recent report for naming dozens of companies that she described as complicit in and profiting from Israel’s war.

“While life in Gaza is being obliterated and the West Bank is under escalating assault, this report shows why Israel’s genocide continues: because it is lucrative for many,” the report states, while urging the ICC to investigate and prosecute corporate executives complicit in the conflict.

Rubio said the report makes “extreme and unfounded accusations.”

“We will not tolerate these campaigns of political and economic warfare, which threaten our national interests and sovereignty,” he said.

“The United States will continue to take whatever actions we deem necessary to respond to lawfare, to check and prevent illegitimate ICC overreach and abuse of power, and to protect our sovereignty and that of our allies.”

Without directly mentioning the sanctions, Albanese said on X that “on this day more than ever: I stand firmly and convincingly on the side of justice, as I have always done.”

“I come from a country with a tradition of illustrious legal scholars, talented lawyers and courageous judges who have defended justice at great cost and often with their own life. I intend to honor that tradition,” she said.

Amnesty International rebuked the United States’ sanctions as “a shameless and transparent attack on the fundamental principles of international justice.”

“Following the recent sanctions against the International Criminal Court, the measures announced today are a continuation of the Trump administration’s assault on international law and its efforts to protect the Israeli government from accountability at all costs,” Agnes Callamard, Amnesty International’s secretary general, said in a statement.

“They are the latest in a series of Trump administration policies seeking to intimidate and silence those that dare speak out for Palestinians’ human rights.”

The war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza began on Oct. 7, 2023, when the Iran-backed militant group killed 1,200 people and took another 251 hostage during a surprise attack on Israel.

In the 21 months since, Israel has destroyed Gaza and killed more than 57,600 Palestinians and injured more than 137,000 others.