Part I — Situation overview

On 18 August 2026 US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that the United States was placing on the sanctions list Tomoko Akane, president of the International Criminal Court (ICC — the permanent court seated in The Hague that proceeds in cases of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity), and Abdoulaye Seye, senior trial lawyer. Akane is a Japanese judge, president of the court since her election in March 2024; Seye is a Senegalese lawyer. The asset freeze and the ban on transactions extending to US-based organisations enter into force on 17 September 2026. The step is part of a wider campaign: according to reports the United States has so far sanctioned more than a dozen ICC judges and prosecutors — Politico Europe mentions at least eleven — and it has called on all 125 states parties of the court to withdraw from the organisation. In his statement Rubio called the court a body that is “corrupt and fatally politicised, mounting an attack on sovereignty”. In its answer the court wrote that when “judicial actors are threatened for applying the law, the international legal order itself is endangered”. As a side effect of the campaign financial institutions have excluded those concerned from a large part of the international banking system as well — the practical effect of the sanction therefore takes hold beyond US jurisdiction too.

The background to the story is known: in 2020 the court opened an investigation on suspicion of American war crimes in Afghanistan, and in 2024 it issued arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. Neither the United States nor Israel is a state party. In June this year three ICC judges brought an action against the American administration over the sanctions. The foreign minister of the host state of The Hague, the Netherlands, Tom Berendsen, publicly rejected the present step and invited Akane for talks, saying that “international courts and tribunals must be able to fulfil their mandate freely”. Several states — among them Chad and Venezuela — have announced their intention to withdraw. Hungary, by contrast, moved in the opposite direction: in May 2026 Parliament revoked the denunciation of the Rome Statute, that is, the country is a state party.

MIAK’s reading: in Hungary this case is not about the substantive judgment of the proceedings in The Hague, nor about whether Hungarian foreign policy should adopt the American or the Dutch position. The stake is narrower and harder: a three-month-old Hungarian legislative decision is coming under external pressure, and it is now being decided where and in what procedure such a question can be settled. If the answer is that it is settled in diplomatic signals and statements, then the weight of the May decision is retroactively reduced — irrespective of whether anyone agrees with it in substance. This is the character of the problem: not substantive, but one of competence and procedure.

Part II — Foundations in the literature

Before turning to the proposals, it is worth recording the framework of principle in which the present situation appears not as an anomaly but as a structural feature of international law. Thomas Hobbes (English political philosopher, the founder of modern theory of the state) formulates in chapters thirteen and fourteen of Leviathan the proposition that in the absence of a common, enforcing power an agreement has no certain binding force — the bonds of words are in themselves too weak — and that where there is no common power, there the law too stands on uncertain legs; international criminal justice operates in precisely such a situation, because its jurisdiction is based on a treaty while its executive force rests on the cooperation of the states parties. The Charter of the United Nations handles the same deficiency from the institutional side: it lays down the basic norms of the peaceful settlement of disputes and of sovereign equality, so the international legal order is built not on a common coercive power but on the obligations undertaken by states — and therefore every decision of a state party that strengthens or loosens these obligations is in itself system-shaping. The handbook Foreign Policy and Diplomacy, published under the editorship of Petru Naumescu, adds from the side of diplomatic practice that treaty obligation and the expectation of the alliance regularly collide, and that the room for manoeuvre of smaller states lies not in avoiding the choice but in the procedural grounding of the decision. The detailed treatment of the literature — by author, with quotations — is to be found in the section 6.4 Literature in detail.

Part III — MIAK’s concrete proposal

MIAK proposes three measurable measures. All three are procedural in nature, and none of them takes a position on the merits of the cases pending before the court.

3.1 Tying every step affecting Hungarian ICC membership to a parliamentary procedural order (immediately, by the beginning of the next session)

Hungary acceded to the Rome Statute by ratification, and the denunciation, and then its revocation, were also settled by a decision of Parliament. This competence is not transferable: the recognition of the binding force of an international treaty and its denunciation are a legislative subject matter, a government decree cannot override it. MIAK proposes that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the competent committee of Parliament record in writing the procedural order under which any preparatory step affecting Hungarian ICC membership — including the Hungarian position represented at the assembly of states parties — may be formed only on the basis of prior, public committee deliberation and an itemised legal justification. This is the direct application of the KP3 transparent foreign policy programme point, and the minimum under the yardstick of A14 international institutional participation and accountability. The substance of the proposal is not that membership should be beyond question — but that if it is questioned, this should be done before Parliament, with a justification. This follows from Hobbes’s argument (see 6.4.1): if the international obligation lives without an enforcing power, then domestic procedural constraint is the only thing that stabilises the undertaking.

The day the sanctions enter into force is known. MIAK proposes that by then a legal assessment of the situation be prepared on what risk may reach those Hungarian lawyers, experts, university researchers and institutions who cooperate with the court in any form: what the exposure to secondary sanctions is, what a possible restriction of access to the banking system means, and whether the European Union’s so-called blocking regulation (Council Regulation (EC) No 2271/96, which prohibits within the territory of the Union the giving of effect to the extraterritorial application of certain third-country sanctions) can be applied to them. This is prior modelling under the KP7 foreign-policy crisis-management protocol, whose very purpose is that it should not start after the first incident. Let the analysis be prepared in writing, and let its non-classified summary be public — the professionals concerned can decide about their participation in an informed way only if they know the risk.

3.3 The geographical indivisibility of the yardstick of judicial independence as a stated doctrine (by the first half of 2027)

The third proposal is the most a matter of principle, and precisely for that reason the most delicate. MIAK proposes that it appear in recorded form in Hungarian foreign policy doctrine: the yardstick of the protection of judicial independence cannot be divided geographically. Whoever regards it in the domestic context as a constitutional foundational value that a judge may suffer no disadvantage on account of their judicial activity has to apply the same yardstick in the case of international courts as well — irrespective of which state’s leaders the given proceedings concern, and irrespective too of which ally the pressure comes from. This is the joint reading of the I4 protection of judicial independence and of the KP4 principled pragmatism doctrine, while the instrument of implementation is the KP23 alliance credibility audit: let the annual survey record item by item which expectations of allies would, if fulfilled, entail abandoning one’s own rule-of-law position. The KP19 international institutional reform position and KP17 issue-based coalition-building add the practical route: clarifying the applicability of the blocking regulation is a member-state interest that a smaller member state cannot assert on its own.

The three proposals are bound together by a single principle: the quality of a decision taken under pressure is protected by the procedure, not by the intention. The first fixes the place of the decision, the second the factual basis of the decision, the third the yardstick of the decision. None of them says what the decision should be — and this is deliberate.

Part IV — Expected effects and risks

Dimension Expected effect Risk
Foreign policy The Hungarian position becomes predictable for partners and allies as well; the public justification reduces the room for misinterpretation The procedural constraint narrows the room for diplomatic manoeuvre; the possibility of a fast, confidential bargain is partly lost
Justice The yardstick of judicial independence becomes uniform in the domestic and the international context, which also gives a usable argument in domestic debates A uniform yardstick is uncomfortable for both political sides: it also binds cases that the given actor would prefer to handle as an exception
Economy and banking system The prior risk analysis reduces the exposure of Hungarian experts and institutions, and clarifies the consequences for the banking system The public description of the risk may in itself have a deterrent effect: professionals step back from the cooperation because of the uncertainty
EU level Clarifying the applicability of the blocking regulation is in the interest of every smaller member state, and is an issue capable of forming coalitions The institutions of the Union have not previously taken a position on this question; the initiative may remain without result

The main dilemma stands between predictability and room for manoeuvre. The procedural constraint gives predictability but reduces the possibility of a rapid reaction — and there are foreign-policy situations in which this is an actual loss. The proposal tips over to the risk side if the procedural requirement becomes a formality: if “prior committee deliberation” means that a decision already taken is approved after the fact. The protection against this is that the justification should be written and public, because a public justification can be checked afterwards, the fact of committee approval cannot.

Part V — Measurability and summary

5.1 What is worth following? (proposed KPIs)

MIAK proposes the following performance indicators (KPIs, Key Performance Indicators) for following — these are proposals, not government undertakings:

  • Existence of the risk analysis: whether the legal assessment of the situation regarding exposure to secondary sanctions was prepared by 17 September 2026, and whether its non-classified summary is public.
  • Procedural compliance: how many of the steps affecting Hungarian ICC membership were preceded by public committee deliberation and a written legal justification — proposed target: 100 per cent.
  • Coalition-building activity: whether Hungary initiated at EU level the clarification of the applicability of the blocking regulation, and how many member states joined the initiative by the end of the first half of 2027.
  • Coverage of the credibility audit: whether the next alliance credibility audit contains item by item the expectations relating to the ICC and their rule-of-law consequences.

5.2 Summary

MIAK’s request in a single sentence: let the question of Hungarian ICC membership be settled not in an exchange of diplomatic messages but before Parliament, with a written legal justification — and let the risk analysis on what happens to the Hungarian professionals cooperating with the court after 17 September be prepared in the meantime. Of the public MIAK asks that it separate the question from the substantive judgment of the proceedings in The Hague: the two are two different debates, and blurring them makes both worse.

Two MIAK foundational values are concerned. Consistency of principle — in MIAK’s system of values the counterpart of being ideology-free — because dividing the yardstick of judicial independence on a geographical or alliance basis is not a position but the abandonment of the position: if the yardstick depends on who exercises the pressure, then there is no yardstick. And openness because the natural place of a decision affecting an international treaty obligation is a public parliamentary debate — not because diplomatic discretion has no place in foreign policy, but because the weight of an obligation undertaken by ratification comes precisely from the fact that it arose in a public procedure.

Part VI — Reasoning and further sources

6.1 The press framing by spectrum

This topic arrived from the sources of the international press monitor, so the framing analysis concerns both the international and the domestic bands.

The international public-affairs band placed the institutional protection of the court at the centre. Al Jazeera detailed the technical content of the sanctions and the court’s answer, and it dealt separately with the earlier cases — with the exclusion from the banking system, and with the fact that financial restrictions apply to a special rapporteur of the United Nations as well because of cooperation with the court. This framing emphasises the system-level effect of the sanctions: it is not about a few individuals but about the cost of cooperation.

The European policy band carried the host-state thread. Politico Europe put the reaction of the Dutch foreign minister at the focus of the story, and with this opened another question: what can a European state do that gives a home to the court, if the officials of the court are sanctioned by one of its allies. This framing stands closest to the Hungarian lesson, because the host-state dilemma is structurally the same as that of a state party: an undertaken obligation under pressure from an ally.

The domestic band did not bring the topic into focus on this day. On the front pages of the Hungarian papers the MTI documentary material and the map of civil-society support were the leading news; the Hungarian aspect of the ICC sanctions did not appear as a separate item. This is in itself a substantive observation: the Hungarian decision of May — the revocation of the denunciation of the Rome Statute — dropped out of daily public discourse within three months, while the international environment in which it was born has meanwhile changed. From MIAK’s point of view this is precisely what justifies the entry: procedural guarantees have to be created when the topic is not yet under political pressure.

6.2 Facts and data

Datum Value Source
Date of the sanctions announcement 18 August 2026 Al Jazeera, Politico Europe
Entry into force of the sanctions 17 September 2026 Al Jazeera, 18 August 2026
Officials concerned President Tomoko Akane (in a judicial capacity), senior trial lawyer Abdoulaye Seye Al Jazeera, Politico Europe
Start of Akane’s presidential mandate March 2024 (election) Al Jazeera
ICC officials sanctioned so far more than a dozen judges and prosecutors (Politico Europe mentions at least eleven) Al Jazeera, Politico Europe
Number of states parties of the court 125 Al Jazeera, Politico Europe
Start of the court’s operation 2002 Politico Europe
Hungarian decision on revoking the denunciation of the Rome Statute May 2026 Decision of Parliament (the domestic context section of the foreign press monitor)
States that announced an intention to withdraw Chad, Venezuela (according to the announcements) Al Jazeera
Judges’ action against the sanctions June 2026, three ICC judges Al Jazeera

6.3 Policy dimensions

  • Foreign policy (programme points and background material) — the handling of international institutional memberships, the weighing between the obligation to the alliance and the position of principle, and coalition-building at EU level (programme point ID: KP3, KP4, KP7, KP17, KP19, KP23).
  • Justice (programme points and background material) — the yardstick of the protection of judicial independence and international criminal-law cooperation (programme point ID: I4).
  • Transparency and anti-corruption policy (programme points) — the accountability of international institutional participation, the public justification of Hungarian positions (programme point ID: A14).

A conceptual clarification that is necessary in every treatment of the topic: the judicial and the prosecutorial function of the ICC are two separate roles, and in the Hungarian system too they cannot be confused — the prosecution service is not part of the administration of justice, and the prosecutor general is not subordinate to the Government. The frequently heard formula “an attack on the court” therefore calls for clarification: Akane was put on the list in a judicial, Seye in a prosecutorial capacity, and the legal situation of the two roles is not identical.

6.4 Literature in detail

6.4.1 Thomas Hobbes: Leviathan

In his description of the state of nature Hobbes formulates the proposition that the categories of law and justice do not take hold without a common, enforcing power:

“Where there is no common power, there is no law; where no law, no injustice.”

In the fourteenth chapter he adds that if there is no common power over the contracting parties with sufficient right and force to compel performance, then the covenant rests on mutual trust — because “the bonds of words are too weak to bridle” a person’s interests. International criminal justice stands in precisely this structural situation: its jurisdiction is grounded on the treaty undertaking of 125 states, while its capacity for enforcement rests on the continuous cooperation of those same states. Two things follow from this for Hungarian policy. One is that the present American campaign is not an anomaly but the exploitation of the structural weakness — so it has to be reckoned with that it will recur. The other is that if there is no enforcing power at the international level, then the undertaking is stabilised by domestic procedural constraint: the parliamentary procedural order and the public justification are not a formality but the only available binding force.

📖 Source: Thomas Hobbes: Leviathan

6.4.2 Charter of the United Nations

The first chapter of the Charter records among the purposes of the organisation the peaceful settlement of international disputes and the principle of the sovereign equality of states, and in the second chapter the basis of member-state obligations. The significance of the document from the point of view of today’s question lies not in one specific article but in its structure: the international legal order is built not on the coercive power of a world state but on obligations undertaken by states and publicly promulgated. This is the institutional answer to the Hobbesian problem — it does not solve the absence of a common power but replaces it with the publicity of the undertaking and with a procedural order for its revocation. In this framework every decision of a state party that strengthens or loosens the obligation points beyond itself: the stability of the system is composed precisely of these individual decisions. The Hungarian decision of May — the revocation of the denunciation — was therefore not an internal affair but a system-shaping step, and precisely for that reason it is justified that changing it should require just as public a procedure as taking it did.

📖 Source: Charter of the United Nations

6.4.3 Petru Naumescu (ed.): Foreign Policy and Diplomacy

The volume treats the practical side of foreign-policy decision-making, and devotes separate attention to the situation in which a state’s treaty obligation and the expectation of its alliance collide. The most important element of the authors’ argument from the point of view of today’s case is that the room for manoeuvre of smaller states lies not in avoiding the choice — the pressure sooner or later compels the choice — but in the procedure and the justification with which the decision is born. A decision taken by a procedural route, with a public justification, is more predictable for partners as well, because it appears not as a function of a current balance of forces but as an institutional position. The volume also deals with the obligations of the host state: the duty of protection of a state hosting an international organisation is a separate diplomatic proposition, which explains the background of the present Dutch reaction. The Hungarian lesson from this is prior preparation under the KP7 protocol: the legal assessment of the situation has to be prepared not under pressure but before it.

📖 Source: Petru Naumescu (ed.): Foreign Policy and Diplomacy

6.5 International comparison

The procedural approach described in the Naumescu volume has been institutionalised in several European states. In several EU member states the denunciation of international treaties and the substantial change of position connected with them are tied to the prior consent of parliament, not merely to its subsequent taking note — this is the model on which proposal 3.1 is built. The application of the blocking regulation also has a precedent: the Union activated Regulation (EC) No 2271/96 earlier as well against the extraterritorial effect of the American sanctions on Iran and Cuba, so the legal instrument exists and has worked — the present question is whether it can be extended to European actors cooperating with the ICC. The Netherlands as host state is shaping the practice concerning the protection of international organisations: the obligation arising from the headquarters agreement is directed at securing the conditions of the organisation’s operation, and this obligation does not cease even in the case of pressure from an ally. All three examples show the same thing: the absence of an enforcing power (see 6.4.1) is made good with procedural constraints and a legal toolkit, not with declarations of principle.

Foreign policy

  • KP3 — Transparent foreign policy
  • KP4 — Principled pragmatism doctrine
  • KP7 — Foreign-policy crisis-management protocol
  • KP17 — Issue-based coalition-building in the EU
  • KP19 — International institutional reform position
  • KP23 — Alliance credibility audit

Justice

  • I4 — Protection of judicial independence

Transparency and anti-corruption policy

  • A14 — International institutional participation and accountability

Proposed new programme point: A parliamentary procedural order for changes of position affecting international treaty obligations — for the Foreign policy area.

6.7 List of sources

Press sources (MIAK foreign press monitor, 19 August 2026 — topic 2):

Knowledge base references (specialist books and sources of law):

  • 📖 Thomas Hobbes: Leviathan
  • 📖 Charter of the United Nations
  • 📖 Petru Naumescu (ed.): Foreign Policy and Diplomacy

MIAK internal materials:

  • MIAK policy area: Foreign policy (background material and programme points; programme point ID: KP3, KP4, KP7, KP17, KP19, KP23)
  • MIAK policy area: Justice (background material and programme points; programme point ID: I4)
  • MIAK policy area: Transparency and anti-corruption policy (programme points; programme point ID: A14)
  • MIAK foreign press monitor, 19 August 2026 — topic 2, score: 91/100

Supplementary public data sources:

  • Official communications of the International Criminal Court and documents of the Assembly of States Parties
  • Updates of the sanctions list of the US Department of the Treasury (OFAC SDN list)
  • Council Regulation (EC) No 2271/96 (the blocking regulation) and its annexes
  • Opinions of the Venice Commission on judicial independence

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