Why Aren’t ICC Warrants Enforced?

The International Criminal Court can issue an arrest warrant against a powerful leader, yet it cannot send officers to carry that warrant out. A judicial order intended to protect humanity is left dependent upon the political willingness of individual governments.

That is the enforcement gap at the centre of international criminal justice. The ICC has judges, prosecutors and a detention centre, but no police or executive force. Under the present Rome Statute system, the Court sends requests for arrest and surrender to states. National authorities must then locate the suspect, make the arrest and transfer the person to The Hague.

A warrant is not a trial

In November 2024, ICC judges issued arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant in the Situation in the State of Palestine, alleging war crimes and crimes against humanity. The allegations remain to be adjudicated. Netanyahu is not on trial because the Court ordinarily requires the accused to be present, and he has not been surrendered into ICC custody.

This is why the question is not simply whether the Court will prosecute. The Prosecutor sought a warrant, judges granted one, and the case cannot progress to trial while the arrest remains unenforced. The ICC itself has no officers empowered to travel to a location, secure the accused and execute its judicial order.

The strongest warrants confront the weakest enforcement

States Parties undertake to cooperate with the Court. When a wanted person enters their territory, the Rome Statute provides a process for arrest and surrender. Yet a government may delay, refuse cooperation or allow a suspect to depart. Non-cooperation can be referred to the Assembly of States Parties or, in some circumstances, the United Nations Security Council, but those political consequences do not place the accused before judges.

The system is therefore weakest when an accused person is protected by a powerful state or powerful allies. The people most capable of organising mass violence are frequently those most capable of resisting arrest.

The case for an ICC Marshals Service

The international community should consider creating a professional, permanent and independently supervised ICC Marshals Service. Its purpose would be to turn arrest warrants from optional diplomatic requests into operational judicial orders.

Within participating countries, ratification could provide advance consent for an ICC arrest team to operate with, or where necessary independently from, national police. A government could not invite a wanted leader, delay action and then claim that administrative processes prevented the arrest before the visitor departed.

The Service could:

• prepare lawful arrest operations as soon as a warrant is issued;
• deploy when a suspect enters a participating state;
• work with national police without surrendering control to political officials;
• protect witnesses and preserve evidence threatened by delay;
• coordinate lawful tracing and restraint of assets;
• document obstruction and trigger immediate consequences for non-cooperation; and
• transfer arrested persons safely and humanely to the Court.

Authority to operate in every country

The ultimate objective should be universal enforceability: a person accused of the gravest international crimes should not obtain immunity merely by remaining inside a protective state. Achieving that lawfully would require more than the ICC deciding to create a team. States would need to confer enforcement authority through amendments, a new convention, Security Council action or another accepted international mechanism.

Entering a non-consenting state with armed force under current law could violate that state’s sovereignty and create further danger. A reformed system must therefore establish the legal authority in advance rather than improvising it after a warrant is issued.

A universal model would need strict safeguards: independent judicial authorisation, necessity and proportionality, minimum force, protection of civilians, due process, transparent operational review and accountability for misconduct by marshals themselves.

Why state permission should not decide whether justice exists

National sovereignty cannot sensibly mean that a government may shelter its own leaders from an international warrant concerning crimes committed against people under its power. Otherwise the very authority accused of wrongdoing retains the power to prevent the case from ever reaching trial.

An international arrest service would not decide guilt. It would do what a domestic marshal does: execute a judicial warrant so that the accused can appear before an independent court, challenge the evidence and receive a fair trial.

International criminal warrants should operate as enforceable judicial orders—not optional diplomatic requests.

A question for the world

If international law is intended to deter genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and aggression, enforcement cannot begin and end with a document. A court that cannot secure the accused risks becoming a recorder of impunity rather than an institution capable of ending it.

The proposal is ambitious, but so was the creation of a permanent International Criminal Court. The next stage of that project should be an enforcement system equal to the seriousness of the crimes the Court was established to confront.