 issues that impact both the Navy and the Coast Guard. We encourage you to follow our Stockton Center Twitter feed and also visit the Naval War College website for information on that event and then events in the future. But today, we're going to talk about the International Criminal Court, specifically emerging legal and policy issues for the United States. And we have a great panel here for you today and a great moderator. Our panelists are Ambassador Morris Tan and Professor Beth Vanscock. We also have a moderator, Professor Laura Dickinson. And we encourage you to use the question and answer tab to ask questions and also you'll be able to upvote the questions that you as an audience find most interesting. So please use the question and answer and please upvote because it will help both our moderator and our panelists address the questions that you're interested in today. I would now like to introduce the Chair of the Stockton Center for International Law, Professor James Kraska. Professor Kraska. Hi, Lieutenant Colonel Cherry. Thank you very much for that and thank you everybody for joining us. The Stockton Center for International Law has a mission to train future leaders and also to progressively develop international law that affects military operations. We have military professors from all five of the US Armed Forces as well as the Royal Air Force. In the past, we've also had military professors from British Army Legal Services, from the Royal Navy and from the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force. And we also host visiting scholars periodically. The Stockton Center collaborates with partners all around the world in these missions. And today it's our pleasure and our honor to be able to welcome Ambassador Tan, Professor Van Schek and Professor Dickinson. And Professor Laura Dickinson will moderate this panel on one of the emerging issues facing the United States. And that is the relationship that we have with the International Criminal Court. And Professor Laura Dickinson is the Oswald Simmeister Cocklow Research Professor of Law and Professor of Law at the George Washington University School of Law in a dear friend and associate of the Center. And she focuses on national security law, human rights law, the law of armed conflict and privatization of foreign affairs. She is very familiar with the issues today that she'll moderate because she worked on them when she was a special counsel to the General Counsel of the Department of Defense. And in that capacity, she was honored and awarded the Secretary of Defense Medal for Exceptional Public Service. So we're honored to have you today. Laura, if I may, I'll turn it over to you. And thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, Professor Kraska, for that overly kind introduction. It really is a privilege and an honor to be here today participating in this Stockton Center event and moderating the discussion with our two very distinguished speakers, Ambassador Morse Tan and Professor Beth Van Scott. So I will introduce both of them shortly. But before that, I would like to begin by noting a distinctive feature of the international court that is very relevant for our discussion today. Specifically, in some limited circumstances, the court's mandate includes jurisdiction over the nationals of states that are not party to the treaty. For such states, such as the United States, the structure has posed certain legal and policy challenges over the years. Now, many of the participants here are probably well aware of the structure of the ICC, but for those who may not be, I thought it might be helpful to provide a very brief overview. The United States, represented at the time by Ambassador David Sheffer, played a key role in the negotiations to draft the Rome Statute, the treaty establishing the court. But ultimately, the United States could not vote in favor of the final text. A key concern was the court's jurisdiction over nationals of non-state parties other than through referral by the United Nations Security Council. The final treaty text provided that the court had jurisdiction over three crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, and war crimes, committed by a national of a state party or on the territory of a state party. Therefore, if the national of a non-party state commits one of these crimes in the territory of a state party, that person could potentially come within the jurisdiction of the court under the terms of the treaty. The United States could not support this aspect of the court's legal framework. And furthermore, two limiting provisions that were adopted in the final text did not do enough to quell the United States concerns. These two principles are the so called gravity threshold, which states that the court can consider only quote the most serious crimes of international concern. That's article one. And the complementarity principle, which states that a case is, a case is inadmissible if the case is being investigated or prosecuted by a state with jurisdiction over it, unless that state is quote unwilling or unable to genuinely carry out the investigation or prosecution. And that's an article 17. So these limitations were not enough to address the United States concerns. Now, the United States did not object to a mechanism that permits the court to assert jurisdiction over the national of a non-party state if the United Nations Security Council refers it. And that's under article 13b. The court was established in 2002 in the Hague, and thus far 28 cases have come before it. Currently 123 states are party to the treaty. And it should be noted that the court has now expanded its jurisdiction to include the substantive crime of aggression. And so as we can see from the history, US concerns about the ICC's legal framework, particularly as it applies to non-party states, date back to the court's inception. And they have to some degree been quite consistent over many years and across multiple administrations. That being said, there have been some shifts in US policy over the years. So for example, President Bill Clinton signed the treaty in the last days of his administration, but President George W. Bush revoked that signature and the United States has never been a party to the treaty. And the recent decision by the court to move forward with the case in Afghanistan that directly implicates the United States and could potentially involve charges against US nationals has increased the urgency of US concerns. And indeed, in June, President Trump issued executive order 13928, authorizing sanctions and visa restrictions on ICC employees. And just last week, Secretary of State Pompeo announced sanctions against two individuals, ICC Chief Prosecutor Fatou Ben-Souda and the ICC's Head of Jurisdiction, Complementarity and Cooperation Division, Fakiso Mocho Choco. So we have a lot to talk about. Our panel today will proceed as follows. First, each of our speakers will present some opening remarks. Then I will pose a series of questions to them for discussion. And then finally, toward the end of the session, I will open up the session for participants' questions, which you can pose in the chat. Our first speaker will be Ambassador Morse Tan. Ambassador Tan is the US ambassador at large for global criminal justice. And when Ambassador Tan was nominated by President Trump and confirmed by the US Senate, he had been serving as the youngest full professor of law at Northern Illinois University College of Law, where his fields of expertise included international criminal law, international human rights law, and constitutional law. He is a graduate of Wheaton College, where he earned both a BA and an MA, and he holds a JD from Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law. He has done numerous impressive things over the course of his career, but I would note especially that he was a founding professor of the first American JD program in Asia at Hamdong International Law School in South Korea. So, Ambassador Tan. Thank you, Professor Dickinson, for that kind introduction. And thank you all for the opportunity to be with you on this important topic. Let me begin by stating upfront that the United States robustly pursues the mission of international justice, both the prevention mitigation as well as the accountability for mass atrocities. In fact, there is no actor upon the world stage that has done or is doing as much in this regard as the United States of America. Moreover, were the United States to withdraw from doing this, many of these efforts to pursue justice around the world would be undermined. After World War II, both Churchill and Stalin wanted to line up Nazi war criminals against a wall and summarily execute them. The United States proposed holding trials instead. Thus, the historic international military tribunals at Nuremberg and for the Far East were established by the Allied powers. The United States led the world in seeking authentic justice for mass atrocity crimes then and continues to do so now. Close to a quarter of a century ago, the United States again made history by inaugurating the first Department of State War Crimes Office, now the Office of Global Criminal Justice, which I have the honor of leading. The United States is the only country with such an office in its foreign ministry. The office's mandate is to address mass criminal atrocities worldwide and we are doing so vigorously. The first ambassador at large to lead this office led the U.S. delegation that participated in the negotiation of the Rome Statute, which established the International Criminal Court. The ICC was specifically intended to address mass atrocities in places where the government's responsible to do so cannot or will not. Prosecuting those responsible for mass atrocities, including genocide crimes against humanity and war crimes, is an ideal the United States elevates in the community of nations. In fact, the United States has provided critical support to international criminal tribunals in recent decades, such as the International Criminal Tribunal for Milniugoslavia, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, and yes, even the International Criminal Court. Unlike China and Russia, the United States has been and continues to be the dominant force for justice in the world today. By contrast, even the staunchest supporters of the ICC have noted that it has been inefficient and ineffective in fulfilling its noble mission. The ICC has indicted approximately 35 individuals in its nearly 20 years of existence. Of those, judges have convicted eight individuals and acquitted four others. Half of the convictions obtained were for core crimes under the Rome Statute and the remaining half were for obstruction of justice. With this backdrop of an unimpressive record, the ICC has chosen to use its limited resources to prioritize a reckless investigation of U.S. personnel in Afghanistan and create a crisis for itself rather than focus on situations involving nationals of actual member states that are borrowing the words of the Rome Statute itself, unable or unwilling genuinely to carry out the investigation. Presumably those taking the ICC on this reckless course were not present in New York City on September 11th, 2001 or familiar with the circumstances of women and girls in Afghanistan at the same time. Perhaps they feel that China or Russia are better suited to fill the global justice gap. There's little evidence that that is a good justice promotion strategy. In contrast, we take seriously, investigate and act upon any alleged violations that may occur. Although many who supported the creation of the ICC believed the Rome Statute contained multiple safeguards to prevent the investigation of U.S. personnel before the court, the ICC has leapfrogged over all of these purported barriers to authorize an investigation into the situation in Afghanistan to include U.S. personnel whom they could have offloaded at any point. This appeals court ruling that came down was stunning because it appeared to remove the role of judges in determining whether an investigation was in the interest of justice. Another check on the prosecutor's ability to initiate investigations designed to be a court of last resort, the ICC's office of the prosecutor has arrogantly irrigated to itself the right to determine whether the United States has done its job in holding U.S. personnel accountable. The prosecutor has also perversely tried to use U.S. efforts to address these matters domestically to inform its request for investigation while simultaneously disregarding these domestic efforts in taking an inappropriately narrow view of complementarity. Intended or not, what the ICC is doing at present is hampering the United States from pursuing justice worldwide. There is a long bipartisan tradition of opposition in the U.S. Congress to the ICC attempting to handle any matters related to our own personnel and justice matters. United States has a longstanding and principled position objecting to attempts by the ICC to assert jurisdiction over its personnel. Their decision is even more reckless when Afghanistan is in a pivotal and delicate moment regarding its internal peace process. The ICC's inability to distinguish between the United States, which has a robust, well-functioning justice system that is the model for the rest of the world and countries that genuinely failed to investigate or pursue prosecutions for mass atrocities puts in stark relief the ICC's paltry record in advancing international justice. The United States has an extensive record of holding its personnel accountable. As to the specific allegations the ICC is concerned with, the United States has conducted its own investigations. Furthermore, it's clear that the United States, with billions of dollars that is spent in rule of law assistance programs, the training conducted by our law enforcement personnel for our partners in scores of countries around the world and our service members literally on the front lines fighting to stop war criminals and genociders like ISIS, has done far more to advance the cause of justice against atrocities than the ICC. Both prior to and since the entry into force of the Rome Statute, our position has been forthright. The United States is not a party to the 1998 Rome Statute that created the ICC for reasons that include this central area of concern and we have not consented to the ICC's jurisdiction over US personnel. The United States tried repeatedly but unsuccessfully during the initial negotiations to point out the flaws inherent in the Rome Statute and the need to subject the ICC to oversight to buy an outside entity such as the UN Security Council lets the ICC's decision making be politicized. The United States also expressed concern that the ICC would seek to investigate and prosecute personnel of non-party states without their consent. Once the formal negotiations ended, the United States spent two more years attempting to negotiate for these reforms. Then in 2002, fruitless in this endeavor and just weeks before the Rome Statute was to was to go into effect, the Bush administration ended its efforts and simply informed the Rome Statute signatories that the United States would not join them when the ICC finally came into being. That same year with bipartisan support, Congress passed American Service Members Protection Act to protect US military and other personnel from criminal investigation and prosecution by the ICC. Historically, Congress has not objected to limited US support to the ICC related to international investigations, apprehensions, and prosecutions of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. The ICC has failed in its own foundational standards of complementarity. It is foundational for any success of the ICC that be a court of last resort. When countries handle their own alleged violations, this generally promotes justice in an efficient and effective manner. As stated on its own website, the ICC was supposed to complement, not replace, national courts. There is a greater global demand and need for justice than four substantive convictions over 20 years, one of which, by the way, is on appeal. Fortunately, there are venues other than the ICC which promote international justice. Instead of spending our time and effort on correcting the mismanagement by and poor judgment of the ICC prosecutor, we should be focused on addressing mass atrocities. Nonetheless, the US government will continue to do both as long as needed. Significant reforms are necessary in order to preserve any integrity of the ICC system that remains, and for the United States to be able to partner where appropriate. However, the ICC's current approach gives too much discretion to the prosecutor. Today, the prosecutor can initiate an investigation with scant checks from judges, despite the fact that state's parties insisted on checks on the prosecutor's ability to initiate investigations, and these checks were heavily negotiated and lead up to the Rome Statute. The weakening of the checks on the prosecutor has led to a politicization of the process and undermines the pursuit of justice globally, and ironic, but significant truth. Unfortunately, there are many places in the world in which an effective international criminal court could contribute to rather than distract from the pursuit of justice. We will put our resources to those endeavors that add value to the pursuit of justice. Thank you. Thank you, Ambassador Tan, for those remarks. We will now be hearing from Professor Beth Von Schock. Professor Von Schock is the Leah Kaplan Visiting Professor in Human Rights at Stanford Law School and Faculty Affiliate with Stanford Center for Human Rights and International Justice. Prior to that, Professor Von Schock served as Deputy to the Ambassador at Large for War Crimes Issues in the U.S. Office of Global Criminal Justice at the Department of State, where she worked on a broad range of global criminal justice issues. She also served previously on the U.S. Interagency Delegation to the International Criminal Court Review Conference in Kampala, Uganda in 2010. She is a graduate of Stanford University Yale Law School, and she also holds a Ph.D. from Leiden University. She is also an Executive Editor of the National Security Blog, Just Security. Beth Von Schock. Good morning, everyone. Thank you so much for convening us and for pulling together a forum to discuss this really important and timely topic. It's really an honor for me to be part of this conversation with Ambassador Tan, who's leading an office that's incredibly important within the U.S. foreign policy establishment. So I am troubled by this turn in the U.S.-ICC relationship, and I say this very much not as a kind of touchy-feely human rights person, but rather as someone who is genuinely concerned about advancing U.S. policy goals around international justice. And I think this turn in the relationship is really hindering our ability to do that across a whole range of issues, and not just when it comes to the Afghanistan and the Palestine situations, both of which I think are animating this new executive order and the sanctions that have been issued under it. So first, from the perspective of efficacy, I'm really skeptical that this belligerent approach is the best policy way to advance our goal of ensuring that no U.S. person is investigated within the Afghanistan situation and no Israeli persons are investigating within the Palestinian situation. And I don't think we should lose sight of the fact that much of the hostility towards the court is not concerning just potential U.S. service members being brought before the court in terms of an investigation, but also the ongoing Israel-Palestine investigation. There are other more principled ways to address, in particular, U.S. service members on the merits, which I think we'll get into today, that have real prospects for success and that will allow us to retain our global standing in atrocities prevention and response in ways that Ambassador Tan so eloquently articulated. We have a long history of leadership in this area, and we can better retain that standing if we work with the court rather than alienate the court in a way that I'm concerned our current policy decisions are doing. As Ambassador Tan mentioned, we have very strong arguments on the merits around complementarity, around gravity, but these arguments are eclipsed by this current stance in terms of sanctioning the chief prosecutor and refusing to engage with the court in any sort of a meaningful way under the rule of law. Second, the optics are really terrible about of deploying a tool that we normally use for drug kingpins, for terrorists, for dictators, for genocidaires, for adversarial states, against individuals that are trying to do their job prosecuting the worst crimes known to humankind. The imposition of sanctions is called civil death. It's literally impossible for individuals to engage in ordinary efforts around banking, getting paid, et cetera, if they're brought into a sanctions regime because they have a nexus in some respect to the United States. And no one doubts that other rogue regimes around the world will trot out this example as justification for harassing their own domestic prosecutors and judges when they would seek to prosecute government actors for corruption, abuses of power, or human rights violations. Third, I'm concerned from a diplomatic, multilateral perspective that we're alienating the very individuals and states that could help us advance both goals, all of our goals in both of these situation countries. And this includes members of the Assemblies of States parties, many of whom are our NATO allies, individuals within the court that I think are quite receptive to our arguments on the merits, academics, and other observers within civil society who agree that the court's record is troubling, that it's taken on too much, that it hasn't gotten the complementarity jurisprudence standards right, and even ultimately the judges who will ultimately decide any jurisdictional challenge that might come before them. Fourth, and this is sort of outside of the court, I'm concerned that we're actually jeopardizing our sanctions authorities more broadly. We're projecting them well beyond the circumstances envisioned by Congress in enacting the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, IEPA, which is the underlying legal authority. There has been calls for Congress to amend IEPA over the years, and this move will only strengthen and magnify those calls. We're also stretching sanctions well beyond what the courts have so far authorized. Generally courts have been quite differential to the executive branch in imposing sanctions, and I'm concerned that that might change, which could bring sanctions under other authorities in in jeopardy as well. And we're also pushing our sanctions authorities well beyond what our allies are willing to enforce. We've already seen resistance within Europe to our policy vis-a-vis Iran sanctions, and there are blocking statutes that are being contemplated that would essentially take European states outside of sanctions enforcement. And so we're weakening a tool that has been incredibly valuable over the years. The risk, of course, is that Congress will amend, that the courts will pull back, and that our allies will not participate. But we could also put in jeopardy the dollar as the world's reserve currency if the international community is tired of us pushing our sanctions too far. Finally, even if this approach is ultimately successful in chilling investigations into the two situations of acute concern to the United States, we have to ask ourselves at what cost is this being brought to U.S. legitimacy in atrocities prevention and response to our long history as eloquently outlined by Ambassador Tan in this area to our commitment to multilateralism and ultimately to our values in terms of the rule of law and human rights. And so even if we succeed in slowing down the investigation in Afghanistan, it might ultimately prove to be a pure victory. So I'll stop there. And I know we're going to get into these issues in our in our subsequent conversation and the Q&A. And I'm really, again, honored to be here. I really respect Ambassador Tan. And I look forward to having a fruitful conversation on these issues. Thank you so much, Professor Von Skak and Ambassador Tan for your remarks. We clearly have a lot to talk about. I am now going to pose questions to our speakers. And after that, we'll open it up to some questions in the chat. So to kick things off, I'm going to start with Professor Von Skak. You said a little bit about this, and so is Ambassador Tan. But could you describe in a little bit more detail the general arc of U.S. policy toward the ICC from the end of the Clinton administration through the Bush administration and Obama administration? Sure. And I'll pick up where you two have left off. So I think the story ended with President Bush revoking or attempting to revoke the signature that President Clinton in the waning days of his office had put on the ICC statute, the Rome statute, which created the court. In the early days of the Bush administration, there was a concerted effort within the political branches to cabin risks to U.S. persons. And this included, as Ambassador Tan mentioned, the enactment of the American Service Members Protection Act, which severely constrained the ability of the United States to cooperate with the court, and also imposed various forms of negative externalities on states that would themselves try and participate in the court. And so we withheld various forms of military and other aid if states moved forward with ratifying the statute or refused to enter into a bilateral non-surrender agreement under Article 98 of the court. We also had efforts to prevent our allied and partner states from joining the court, and we negotiated a number of these non-surrender agreements, over a hundred of them that are now in place. Now, over the years, even under the Bush administration, this began to shift. Number one, it was realized that some of the negative sort of penalties that we were placing on states around the world from participating with participating in the court were actually redundant to our, we're not redundant to our benefit. In fact, we're quite harmful. And it was Secretary Rice who spoke about these being counterproductive, like shooting herself in the foot. So over the years, many of those have been declawed. What's left now of ASPA is a general prohibition against cooperation with the court, subject to an important exception that was imposed by Senator Dodd during the negotiations of that treaty that says, in essence, the United States can assist with individual prosecutions of individuals for war crimes, genocide, or crimes against humanity. And so toward the end of the Bush administration and then into the Obama administration, the United States developed a really productive, ultimately working relationship with the court, because all of the situation countries that it was investigating at that time were basically, the United States was supportive of the imperative international justice in those situations. And so we allowed the Darfur referral to go forward. We supported the Libya referral from going forward. We provided very substantive assistance in prosecutions around war crimes and crimes against humanity and the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central African Republic when it came to the Lord's Resistance Army where there was a lot of interest within Congress and even the US public in seeing justice for the crimes of the Lord's Resistance, committed by members of the Lord's Resistance Army. And so we ended up with a kind of working modus vivendi, where we could provide forms of cooperation and assistance, so long as it was consistent with US policy and with US law under ASPA. And this I want to emphasize is not a Democratic versus Republican issue. This change really happened during the Bush administration when it was finally realized that the court offered a useful institution to advance US interest around justice in countries where we cared about seeing justice happening. So this is where the Trump, the Obama administration left off. Now, in the early days of the Trump administration, there were few outward indications as where things stood. But this very must change with the appointment of John Bolton, his national security advisor, who has a really almost congenital antipathy towards the court. And so he announced a very aggressive change of policy in a speech and then that laid the groundwork for the executive order that we've discussed. And so that's really the arc. It's been a situation of almost constant flux and evolution since the ICC statute was first promulgated. Thank you. That's really helpful. Just to follow up, could you say a little bit about the Afghanistan case specifically? Sure. So Afghanistan ratified the treaty in 2003. And so the court now has jurisdiction from that moment onward. In 2004, there was evidence emerged from Abu Ghraib, as we remember, that there were custodial abuses happening within US detention centers. And then similar revelations began to emerge regarding Guantanamo and then within Europe with certain CIA Black sites. At the same time, there were multiple war crimes and crimes against humanity being committed within Afghanistan with other armed actors, including Afghan security forces, but most tellingly really the Taliban and some of the Al Qaeda affiliates and now ISIL affiliates that are still active within Afghanistan. So the office of the prosecutor began to receive submissions with respect to a whole range of potential crimes that fall within the ICC jurisdiction. And as is the policy, she opened what's called a preliminary examination into the Afghanistan situation. This is a sort of surface level jurisdictional determination as to whether or not crimes that fall within the ICC jurisdiction were committed, whether or not there might be a complementarity bar to pursuing, whether or not the gravity standards have been met, and whether there are countervailing interests of justice that might suggest that she should not move forward. This is one area that is a troubling policy in that the prosecutor looks at the entire situation. So she's not necessarily just looking at US persons or international forces, but the Taliban, our terrorist groups, other militia forces, all of them fall within her purview. And so that entire crime base has been the subject of her preliminary examination for quite some time. So this was the situation until about 2017 when the prosecutor moved what's called the pretrial chamber to be able to open a full scale investigation. This is when she can utilize her investigative tools. During the preliminary examination phase, she's in a much more passive role receiving information from outside stakeholders like nongovernmental organizations, other governments, the government of Afghanistan itself, et cetera. She did ultimately receive authorization to proceed, although the pretrial chamber originally withheld that. That was then overturned on appeal. And because the reasoning of the pretrial chamber was quite flimsy, it left many people assuming that the judges had caved to US pressure. And so it was almost predictable that the office of the prosecutor would appeal that determination and that the appeals chamber would ultimately reverse. And so now theoretically, this investigation can proceed. Of course, we're in a situation with a global pandemic. The security situation on the ground is still quite fraught within Afghanistan. And so it's not clear whether any investigation has actually been able to advance at all. And again, I just want to emphasize that the any investigation that moves forward includes the entire situation. So including all of these other armed actors and extremely serious episodes of deliberate attacks against civilians and crimes against humanity against the civilian population. So to the extent that US custodial abuses are a component of this, it's a quite small component, although, you know, a highly salient one. Thank you, Professor Von Scott. The next question is for Ambassador Tan. Can you describe the recent executive order number 13928 and the rationale for that order? Yes, thank you. I want to, first of all, before answering the question, express my genuine regard for Professor Von Scott, as well as for Professor Dickinson, as well as for our host, the Naval War College, who is hosting this event. And I also want to emphasize, first of all, the common ground that we share as Americans, that there it really is a bipartisan thing, both to pursue the ideals of addressing mass atrocity crimes, but also to see to it that our people are held accountable within our system, which is more than capable of being able to handle these things. I also want to mention how the Afghanistan investigation can choose to off-ramp the US component of it, which is, as Professor Von Scott has mentioned, very small. It is not a major portion of what has happened in the situation in Afghanistan. And I did find the appeals decision to be somewhat of a reactionary response to try to assert its independence, and rather than allowing the pretrial chamber to amplify its description of the interests of justice and its ruling on that basis, instead it moved forward in a rather reactionary way. With all that said, let me address the executive order. The executive order really expresses the determination of the President and the Secretary to see to it that the United States of America can continue to lead the world in helping to prevent and mitigate mass atrocity crimes going on around the world. And so I think there should be a lot of concern on the part of countries who are experiencing mass atrocity crimes where the US can or does intervene to try to prevent or mitigate. I think such countries should be very concerned that the US has continued to be targeted in this Afghanistan investigation. In regards to the basic content of the executive order, it authorizes the imposition of economic sanctions and visa restrictions on ICC personnel directly engaged in efforts to investigate US or allied personnel without the relevant state's consent, as well as those who materially support those designated under the EO. And something that I want to say, I've seen in some of the responses around the world, including from allied states and NGOs and others, some responses that expressed concern or fear of how far this EO would extend. I want to say first and foremost that while it is broadly worded, it is not being implemented in a way that wildly goes off to those who are most remotely involved in what is transpiring. Instead, one might think of it in terms of concentric circles that right at the pith or right at the core of it, you have the inner circle of those who were most directly involved in putting American personnel potentially on the hook before the ICC rather than acknowledging the US investigative efforts. And it would only be moving out successively from there to the extent needed. Let me also reiterate what Secretary Pompeo has said that he takes no pleasure in moving forward along these lines, that this is something that was deemed necessary in terms of protecting our personnel and protecting our ability to be able to prevent and mitigate mass atrocity crimes worldwide. And with that, I'll stop my response at this point. Thank you. Thank you, Ambassador Tan. I just want to follow up. If I could, could you just explain under the order what would trigger the government or what might trigger the government to name a person or entity? Yeah, thank you for that question. Let me just say as a baseline, first of all, that we don't really speak about potential or future designations. I will also repeat what Secretary Pompeo has said that the US is not its party to the ICC and we will take necessary measures to protect our personnel. But I will revert back. I think framing the question in terms of triggering is probably not the way to think of this matter. We are trying to use the best information at our disposal to fairly and to accurately determine who is most directly involved and moving out from there, as I had mentioned previously. That's probably the extent to which I can respond to it further. Thank you for that explanation. The next question is for Professor Von Schock. The executive order refers to, quote, the ICC's illegitimate assertions of jurisdiction over personnel of the United States. And it argues that these assertions of jurisdiction, quote, threaten to infringe on the sovereignty of the United States and threaten the national security and foreign policy of the United States. Further, quote, any attempt by the ICC to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute without consent, any US personnel or personnel of US allies who are not party to the Rome statute constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. The stated goal of the order is to protect US persons. With that in mind, how do these claims and associated sanctions address the ongoing issues between the United States and the ICC? So thanks for that question. And I really think that's the fundamental one, right? As a policy maker, one wants to implement policies that are ultimately going to be effective to achieve the underlying goals of those policies. I conducted a study after the executive order was issued. So this was before the sanctions had actually been, individuals have been designated under that order. And the word that constantly came up, including within critics of the court, individuals who insist that the United States has no obligations to affirmatively cooperate with the court, others that might be allies in advancing some of the arguments we'd like to make around reforming the court and its working methods, the consistent word that emerged amongst all of these voices was counterproductive. Basically how self-defeating this course of conduct might be. And while a policy that packs a symbolic punch can be really emotionally satisfying, and I think Pompeo's remarks and others have indicated that the point was to signal our resolve in this regard. And we've certainly done that. We have signaled our resolve. But policy makers should aim to advance rather than undermine the ultimate goals of whatever their policy happens to be. And I think bullying individual members of the court, and it did not go unnoticed that these are two Africans, right, two people who come from Africa. Meanwhile, the prosecutor's deputy, who is from Canada and is an ally of ours, does not get sanctioned. Why was that decision made to sanction the chief prosecutor, but not her deputy, who's much more involved in the day-to-day operations? I don't mean to throw him under the bus here, but he's much more involved in the day-to-day operations of the court and of its ongoing investigations. The objects of that look really unsettling. Especially vis-a-vis our role in the world, trying to build coalitions with respect to other policies that we care about. Many have argued that this approach is not incentivizing members of the court or court actors to stand down and to turn their attention to other armed groups within Afghanistan or to other situations generally. This course of conduct will actually sort of inspire them as to the righteousness of their cause. And there was even a set of political scientists who did a study that suggested the so-called stri-sand effect will kick in. And this is a psychological principle that says, when you consistently insist not to look at something, everyone immediately wants to go and look at that thing. And so we could end up reviving a whole examination of US custodial abuses in the early days of the Afghanistan situation. I mean, even potentially looking more closely at current harm against civilians that are associated with international forces that are still active within Afghanistan. Now, what we've seen so far since the executive order was issued, and now with the sanctions, is a real chilling effect around a whole range of international justice efforts around the world. Small NGOs working in Myanmar who are investigating the genocide against the Rohingya are afraid to share their files with the ICC because Bhatu Ben-Suta, the chief prosecutor, is the designated person under our sanctions award. Special assistance, including US citizens who are focused on crimes against humanity and the protection of children in armed conflict, feel like they have to withdraw their assistance from the court because there is an enforcement risk against them. Actors within the Sudan who are trying to establish a new democratic order of which the court is a part because the former president has been indicted for genocide are afraid to participate and assist in the work of the court because there's a risk of designation. And I appreciate Ambassador's tan analogy of these concentric circles and to be sure many of these small NGO actors and academics and others are on the outer those outer circles, but it cannot be denied that there is a risk here. And if there seem to be too close to the court, they could be subject to either an enforcement risk or if there are a US person or a designation risk if they're a foreign person. So what we're seeing is a chilling of international justice efforts globally that are that goes well beyond the Afghanistan situation and the Palestine situation. Thank you, Professor von Scott. And so my next question is really a follow up to that for for Ambassador tan, which is that these sanctions are undeniably a very powerful global tool. And so even if one agrees with the US position with respect to the ICC, do the ICC issues merit the exercise of this tool? Do they merit such sanctions? As I had indicated before, the ICC could have off ramp the small portion that involves alleged American abuses and has steadfastly refused to do so. There can still yet, as I understand it, still be a choice to off ramp the US portion of this. And we may yet see that the sanctions are something that are intended to be employed to the extent necessary. And so in a lot of ways, the ICC holds the key itself to get these to stop. There are all sorts of actions that the ICC itself can take to not only off ramp in terms of the Afghanistan investigation, but make it so that these sorts of things would not be possible in the future. I do want to make a few comments in response to what Professor von Scott was saying. I want to say emphatically as a racial minority myself that the specific designations had absolutely nothing to do with race. There was an attempt to be fair, objective, accurate in regards to this. And so I want to make that very clear. I also want to make it very clear that we are affirmatively supporting justice efforts all over the world, whether it is UNITAD, or the triple IM, or the double IM, or in the Central African Republic, or the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, or whether it is the Kosovo Specialist Chambers. We are actively, affirmatively supporting these efforts all around the globe. And so for others to interpret the sanctions and the EO as somehow contrary to the fact that we are actually supporting justice initiatives all over the world would be rather narrowly viewing things. And if I could more directly address your question, yes, the possibility of an unchecked politicized prosecutor pursuing, and might I mention also corrupt, pursuing US personnel was the United States fundamental concern during the negotiations related to the Rome Statute. And it remains the same today, recklessly ignoring the limits of its mandate and foundational principles of complementarity, as well as other doctrines meant to cabin in the power of the prosecutor. The ICC has created its own crisis and created distraction from efforts towards global justice by moving forward to investigate US personnel. Ironically, to not take a strong stand against this reckless move would undermine the United States' ability to lead or participate in military and other missions around the world, including those that help deter mass atrocities. I might also add that the timing of all this seems rather curious in various regards. Thank you, Ambassador Tan, for that response. I want to follow up with a different question for you, Ambassador Tan. And that is, some have suggested that the Obama and Trump administrations have been relatively consistent in their approach to the ICC, with respect to furthering the goal of protecting US combat operations and service members serving in those operations, protecting them from any judicial investigation. Do you agree with that? Basically, yes, I would. I do think that no administration, Democratic or Republican, would find it acceptable what the ICC has decided to throw itself into. Certainly, concerns around the Rome Statute's failure to address this foundational concern resulted in bipartisan passage of the US Congress of the American Service Members Protection Act in 2002, which rejected the idea of the ICC's overbroad non-consensual assertions of jurisdiction. US remains committed to accountability, but the ICC and parties to the Rome Statute must respect the decisions of the US and other countries not to subject the personnel to the ICC's jurisdiction consistent with their respective sovereign prerogatives. I would personally look forward to the day when the ICC would cease from this sort of misadventure, and that there would be hopefully brighter days for the actual mission of the court and of my office to shine forth in a way that can be more possible and more enabled rather than deterred as has been going on with respect to this reckless investigation of the court. Thank you. The next question is for Professor Von Schock. The operation of the ICC presents a variety of long-term issues for the US government. For example, Senator Leahy has noted, quote, the United States cannot profess to stand for accountability and refuse to be accountable itself, especially when it involves egregious crimes like torturing prisoners, end quote. If it were up to you, what kind of diplomacy should the United States use to engage the ICC in the near and distant future? It's a terrific question, and I think there's a number of lines of effort that I would like to see imposed vis-a-vis the ICC and thinking about it as an institution that's part of a larger system of international justice. As I mentioned, both the Bush and Obama administrations eventually established a productive working relationship. There were a number of formal and informal lines of communication through which we could convey our position on matters of concern around a whole range of issues in situation countries, including Afghanistan. And I'm worried that we've largely shut off those lines of communication at this point. So I would like to see those being rebuilt. I think that was a productive way in which we could continue to push our ideas vis-a-vis the prosecutor and others within the court, and that we've maybe lost that now. I also thought that we could develop a more nuanced position, so we don't have to throw the baby out with the bathwater. While we can vigorously defend our interests around the Afghanistan situations, I would like to continue to find a way to assist the court in the other situation countries where justice and accountability is directly consistent with U.S. policy in those particular arenas. Third, we have extremely strong, incredible arguments around complementarity and gravity, and we should deploy those vigorously, but within the context of the rule of law. The State Department, the Department of Defense, the CIA have some of the best lawyers in the world, and they should be allowed to work to make arguments. We should subject our arguments to scrutiny. We should deal with opposition to those arguments. We should work on arguments to strengthen our own arguments. And we should be able to push the point that Ambassador Tan has made, that U.S. service members are subject to robust and fair military justice and internal disciplinary systems that we're proud of, and we should be able to prove that those have worked, and we should defend the operation of those systems, and that certain individuals that may have gone beyond what was lawful were doing so with the advice of counsel, and so those defenses exist. And what concerns me is that the approach that we have taken are deafening individuals to those arguments. They're not going to have the efficacy, and we're not going to have the space in which to make them. On balance, I still believe, even absent this particular approach by the Trump administration, that it's highly unlikely that any U.S. person would be indicted by the ICC or would find themselves to be subject to the court. But I have to concede that the risk is not zero, and there are many in the government that will only be satisfied if that risk is brought down to zero. But I don't think this is the course of action to achieve that. Professor Von Skuck, you mentioned the complementarity doctrine. So this question is for Ambassador Tan, following up on that. How has the United States used doctrine of complementarity to further the goal of protecting U.S. combat operations and service members serving in those operations? And how does the United States interpret the complementarity doctrine? Thank you for that question. I wanted to, prior to answering that question, just touch on things that Professor Von Skuck has said. I'd like to give a certain assurance that there are all sorts of lines of communication that have been and remain open. And so that concern, I'd like to say, I'd like to assure Professor Von Skuck and everyone else that we have all sorts of lines of communication that remain open, and we are using all sorts of lines of communications. And so these have not been lost, although I appreciate the concern that was raised. I appreciate also what Professor Von Skuck has mentioned in terms of gravity. The crimes of the Taliban are the ones that would rise to the level of satisfying gravity in regards to the Afghanistan investigation. And that's well known to everyone who is cognizant of what is happening and what has happened in that space. More directly to the question that Professor Dickinson had raised. The United States, as well as several key allies that are state parties to the ICC, are of the view that the ICC's view of complementarity is much too narrow. Reports from credible national investigations processes largely reflect evidence that a nation, that our nation has an active and robust system of accountability, but the ICC is not taking a systemic approach to complementarity. Instead, the ICC seems focused on the existence and quality of national criminal prosecution of particular individuals for the same conduct. And this is not what was intended when the ICC was established. I've heard people in relation to complementarity and the ICC, even from within the ICC, saying there have to be convictions in order to be satisfied. And that seems to be a last... Ambassador Tan, I think you're cutting out a little bit. We got a good chunk of what you were saying, but at this point, we're having trouble hearing you. I think while the ambassador works on that, I'm going to turn to Professor von Schock on this issue because I think Ambassador Tan is articulating a U.S. view of the complementarity doctrine that is fairly different from what the ICC has asserted thus far. Professor von Schock, do you think it is possible or likely that the ICC could revise its view of complementarity and perhaps move more in the direction of the U.S. approach? So Ambassador Tan is exactly right that there's been a lot of criticism, both academic and diplomatic, about the approach that the ICC has taken to this question of complementarity. The standard that the jurisprudence has landed on is this idea of same person, same conduct. So unless the state in question has prosecuted the exact person for the same conduct that the ICC is considering, complementarity is not satisfied. And so the court could continue to move forward with a prosecution, even if the state in question has undertaken a whole range of systemic reforms, has prosecuted other individuals, has utilized other disciplinary systems, has implemented policy changes, has enacted new laws that might prevent a recurrence of abuses, all of these factors that might go into a determination of whether or not the state is unwilling or unable. That's all the statute says, is this the state unwilling or unable to address these concerns? And so the court has landed on a very narrow interpretation and even supporters of the court will concede that that is setting the court up for a whole series of clashes with states and that the court should revive its jurisdiction, its jurisprudence around this area to take, as Ambassador Tan mentioned, a more systemic approach. So if I were, you know, trying to push complementarity within the US context as a lawyer representing the United States, I would on the one hand argue that we can meet the standard that has been established by the court because we have a strong system of military justice, we have a disciplinary system, et cetera. I would also think about trying to release more information from the Department of Justice about why certain decisions were made not to move forward with prosecutions, particularly when it comes to members of the CIA and some of the abuses in CIA black sites. This could involve, for example, releasing the results of the Durham investigation, which generally found that there were no grounds to move forward except potentially with respect to two cases of custodial deaths. I would also think about releasing more information from the Department of Justice about why they decided not to move forward on investigations vis-a-vis those two deaths. I don't think anyone doubts that those were a rigorous process, that prosecutors were looking at the following the evidence where it goes, looking at the whole system and the situation at play, including advice of counsel that had come out of the Office of Legal Advisor and the Department of Justice, and so try and make the argument under the existing standard. At the same time, diplomatically, I would be working with our allies, with the Assembly of States Parties, drafting amicus briefs in other situations where the question of complementarity has arisen in order to try and demonstrate that this is not what states had in mind when they were designing this process of complementarity and considering the court as truly a court of last resort, that it's only when you have the failure of the domestic system should the court step in and assert jurisdiction. And so I think there's this multiple line of attack work within the framework of the court to make the arguments, but then also work diplomatically with allies to think about ways to try and get the court to change course when it comes to complementarity. And this could potentially be done through rules changes that are in the control of the Assembly of States Parties. Now, again, if we've alienated our allies in the Assembly of States Parties by taking this very bellicose approach and by sanctioning the prosecutor, it's not going to render them sort of receptive to some of these diplomatic overtures. And we're very much dependent on the Assembly of States Parties to push the kinds of rule changes that we would like to see. And we're not in a position now to be able to effectively argue those. And I would also, I'm really heartened to hear that there are still lines of communication. I don't think we were at a dead end here. I think we could continue to appeal to the Office of the Prosecutor to exercise her discretion and to find a way to indicate that her attention is really focused on crimes against humanity and other grave war crimes committed by the Taliban and other armed actors over this 20 year and plus conflict within Afghanistan. Thank you, Professor Von Scott. That is very interesting. I'd like to ask you another question about a different doctrinal issue that is potentially implicated here. The treaty establishing the ICC derives from the authority of States Parties that agreed to it. Can such a treaty lawfully provide for a court to assert jurisdiction over non-state parties? Is there a viable legal argument under international law that this is impermissible? What's your view of the strength of this type of argument? So it is an argument that has been articulated. I'm skeptical, however, of the strength of it, not only from the perspective of is it in fact a statement of international law and can we find precedent and support for that statement, but also whether or not the interlocutors that matter find it at all convincing. So we've been deploying versions of this argument for several years now and we're not winning anyone over with these arguments. I think the strongest sort of counter argument is that all of the international crimes treaties that are out there, torture, war crimes, the Geneva Conventions, all of the terrorism treaties, etc., provide for jurisdiction over the nationals of non-parties to those treaties. So this is essentially the idea of universal jurisdiction and the United States has regularly exercised this type of jurisdiction. We have a whole suite of statutes that allow us to prosecute individuals for international crimes even if the state in question has not ratified whatever the constitutive treaty was, be it the genocide convention or the torture convention. And so already we have a principle in international law that certain crimes are such that all states have jurisdiction over them regardless of whether or not the state of nationality of the accused has somehow accepted the existence of a particular prohibition. Historically, talking points around this have been really careful about how they've articulated this question as to whether or not it's a legal question or whether or not the United States has views or objections to the ICC exercising jurisdiction over the nationals of non-state parties. And I think there is a strong argument that the ICC should be in a different posture vis-a-vis non-state party actors because we have not accepted the entire rubric of the Rome statute. There may be jurisdiction over those members, but maybe there might be additional deference that should be accorded to non-state parties, parties that have chosen to remain outside of the Rome statute system. And so I think those arguments could be explored. I think we will have a much better reception, however, for arguments sort of on the merits. But there's been an unwillingness to really develop and deploy those arguments because I think of an articulated fear that it will somehow legitimize the court if we abandon this kind of threshold argument on legality and focus instead on some of the standards and principles that are within the Rome statute. If you've ever been a trial... Professor Von Scott is cutting out. Can anyone hear me? Okay, people can hear me. It looks like we are having some connectivity problems. Let's try something a little different to try to address that. I think we got a lot from Professor Von Scott on that question, and I'd like to turn back to Ambassador Tan. I think what we can try, Ambassador Tan, is for you to respond just with the sound, as opposed to with your video and sound, because we think Zoom will have a better ability to function that way. So I'd like to ask you, Professor Ambassador Tan, about Article 18 of the Rome Statute, what is that article and how might it work in the Afghanistan case? Thank you for that question. And if I might, I'd like to just address a few things that Professor Von Scott has mentioned. I want to indicate that there is an extensive public record of things that the US has done in regards to addressing this matter. There was mention of the Durham Report. And I think Professor Von Scott has also helpfully mentioned the caliber of the attorneys who have been working on these matters. And when these top-notch attorneys say that there are no grounds to move forward, I'm inclined to give them what is there. I also wanted to mention that there are conversations that are ongoing to look at this together with allied countries and to think about how we can solve this together in a constructive way, how there can be amendments to the Rome Statute, how there can be rule changes. And I also say that the approach to sanctions has been, in the outside view, has been described as measured. And it would also be, I think, apt for me to say that is the Secretary's view that even if it was US personnel who were potentially the subject of sanctions by another country for the work that the US personnel did inside ICC in a way that was illegitimate, that the US would be supportive of addressing that even with measures such as what the US is employing. So with that said, if I could turn more directly then to the Article 18 question that Professor Dickinson mentioned, Article 18 allows the state to seek a deferral of an investigation by informing the court that is investigating or has an investigation in June, the prosecutor shall defer the investigation unless and until the prosecutor seeks and receives authorization from the pretrial chamber to proceed. It's unclear how the prosecutor will respond to Afghanistan's submission, which applied to all elements of the proposed investigation into the situation in Afghanistan. The prosecutor has not sought the requisite judicial authorization to override the deferral, but has also not made any public statement about it. The prosecutor's deferral to Afghanistan would be open to review after six months or earlier in the event of significant changes of circumstances and I will conclude by mentioning that Article 18 has never been invoked before. This is the first time, so there is no precedent to look at and we will see what happens, but in the meantime the investigation has been described as frozen as a result. Thank you Ambassador Tan. I want to turn to a different question for you and that pertains to a different provision in the ICC statute, the UN Security Council Referral Provision of the Statute, that's Article 13B that we talked about earlier. Could you say a bit about the history of the US position on such referrals? Yes, I can. Historically the US has taken a case-by-case approach to the ICC. Incidentally, with respect to the convictions that were there, the US was involved in a couple of those instances and so it has been case-by-case and while the US has participated extensively in the negotiations to create the ICC, we did not ratify the Rome Statute in large part due to serious concerns about provisions that would allow the ICC to investigate and prosecute nationals of non-state parties. However during President Bush's second term, as has been alluded to, the United States provides some support for the ICC or decided not to oppose the ICC on a limited basis. For example, in 2005 in the face of genocide and mass killings in Darfur, the United States abstained on and thus allowed the adoption of a UN Security Council Referral of the situation in Darfur to the ICC. In other words, we didn't exercise our veto power that we have as one of the five permanent members. Under the Obama Administration, the United States decided in 2009 to consider on a case-by-case basis supporting certain ICC investigation prosecutions that were consistent with US national interests and law. Let me just amplify a bit on US constitutional law and due process, the ICC does not pass muster in terms of meeting US constitutional due process and other standards that are there and so we certainly don't want to submit our own people to sub-constitutional standards that the ICC has. In 2011, the United States voted in favor of a UN Security Council resolution that referred the situation in Libya to the ICC. In 2013 and 2015, the US government facilitated the transfer of two individuals, including an LRA commander to the ICC to stand trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Thank you. Thank you, Ambassador Tan. I just want to follow up on that and just ask, do you think that the US could support prosecutions of members of non-state armed groups under this Security Council referral position? Thank you for that question. We are currently focused on the ICC correcting its ongoing error of mismanaging its resources, inefficiently pursuing justice, exceeding its mandate, and its inappropriate targeting of US personnel. If these concerns are resolved in a permanent manner, we would need to review case by case if it is consistent with our values and interests to allow referrals of other situations through the Security Council. It is also relevant that the ICC success rate has been limited to date. Thus other avenues may be more effective than the ICC in a given instance. It is a case by case analysis, and we would like to see systemic reform of the ICC before I think there would be more serious consideration of the sort of cooperation that had occurred in the past. Thank you. Thank you. I want to make sure we have some time to get to some of the excellent questions that are coming up in the chat. And one question has to do with the soft power effect of the decision to sanction. Can you say anything about that? The administration is clearly concerned about the court, but how did the cost benefit calculation play out in the specific decision to sanction? One of the things that I would like to assure everyone of is that all sorts of softer and lighter attempts and approaches were tried. This was not something where the US rushed into this decision in terms of this executive order. It was thought out and it was deliberated upon in a very thoroughgoing extensive sort of way, and it was in essence considered a last resort vis-a-vis the other lighter and milder approaches that were taken in fact and do continue to be taken as we speak. And so this is a situation where we would prefer for it not to be deemed necessary. And if the ICC and its member states were to move in a direction where it was no longer necessary, that would be welcome indeed. And so this is not something that happened as a rushed decision or in any sort of haphazard sort of way as at all. It has in fact been measured and it is these other approaches that are being referred to. There are all sorts of things that are still going on along those lines without specifying all the things that I'm not allowed to speak about. I can very much assure those who are listening that there are all sorts of things that are ongoing in terms of trying to resolve this naughty situation, naughty K-N-O-T-T-Y situation that is going on. And so that was the case prior to the EO that continues to be the case even as the EO is being applied to the extent that is necessary to do so as deemed by the President and the Secretary. Thank you, Ambassador Tan. I think we have time for one more question. And there's a question here about the United States agreement with the government of Afghanistan for certain individuals to receive diplomatic immunity. And so the question is, if an individual who has diplomatic immunity commits a crime that is raised to the attention of the ICC, would the ICC attempt to override that? Perhaps I could get some clarification on the question because there is such a thing as diplomatic immunity generally. There are also the Article 98 agreements. There's also the Chessomia and Chessoya agreements. So I'm not sure exactly what is being asked here. Well, the question is specifically about diplomatic immunity, but I think you raise an important point that there are quite a few types of immunity questions that could arise. And there are a variety of legal arguments that could be made about each of them, in particular about diplomatic immunity. I think Jen Murray, who posed the question, could clarify if she would like. Hi. My name is Jennifer. I was just curious for like, for instance, US personnel maybe at the who are assigned at the embassy. And typically, I guess if they do something, maybe accidentally kill someone or whatnot, they normally try to get them out of country as quick as possible. And then the US will handle things from there. But I'm curious if the ICC, if they would feel like they could intervene in any way, shape, or form if they felt that whatever the US was doing to take care of the situation wasn't good enough. Well, I'm sure Ambassador Tan may want to weigh in on that. But I would just note that, remember, the ICC only has jurisdiction over a very small subset of crimes, war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. And so, I mean, it's not clear that that would come up in that hypothetical. But as to your question, I mean, there are strong doctrines of diplomatic immunity that would be applicable in any kind of a case. Ambassador Tan. Yeah, I mean, you have the Vienna Convention, right, that provides, that specifically addresses things like diplomatic immunity in general. You're correct in terms of your question that there are past instances where things come up in a country where under, say, the status of forces agreement, the SOFA that is there, the US has jurisdiction to do so. This does, I think, go back to complementarity, right? Whenever there is a complementarity basis for the country who is able and willing to do so, the ICC is required to back off and to stay in the wings as a court of last resort. And the ICC has not been doing this, is not doing this here. And let me just say that it seems to me that the ICC seems to be trying to extend its jurisdiction more and more broadly in all sorts of interesting and novel ways. What it's asserting, for example, in the Central African Republic, in essence gives it primacy jurisdiction, so they claim. And so that is, would be a problem in terms of its fundamental commitment to be a court of last resort and for complementarity to exist. What it's seeking to do and in the Central African Republic, in essence, flips that on its head. And so it's not just the US, but there are concerns and a need for reform in the ICC in general in all sorts of ways that affect countries far beyond the US as well. Thank you, Ambassador Tan. And I would just note that this point about complementarity that both you and Professor von Scott have made is a really important one and that the court has interpreted complementarity in a way that doesn't give that much deference to domestic jurisdictions. And I think there's a lot of room for that doctrine to evolve, shall we say. With that, I mean, we could just keep talking for hours about this. And I really want to thank our speakers for such a substantive, rich, thoughtful discussion and to our participants for their really good questions. Again, it's really an honor to be part of this and I want to turn it back over to John Sherry to close things out. Thank you very much, Laura and I echo your sentiments to Ambassador Tan and to Professor von Scott for your participation today. Of course, she provided a valuable perspective on what is truly an important and compelling issue. And I thank the audience as well for your participation and for your questions. Your engagement makes this both more interesting for us and for the other attendees. So thank you very much. And last but not least, we encourage you to follow us on Twitter at Stockton Center and also to come back to the Naval War College website for future events. We look forward to hopefully seeing you to the next Stockton series panel, which will take place in October. Thank you again to everyone who participated and have a great day.